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ABSTRACT
This article critically examines commemoration at the local-level, drawing on extensive qualitative research spanning over two decades in the Ardoyne community of North Belfast. This longitudinal approach allows us to track memory work in one community in the aftermath of political violence. The research shows that ‘post-conflict’ memorialization has shifted in Ardoyne, with less emphasis on victims’ voice and unresolved justice legacy issues, and towards ‘ownership’ of republican activist dead and political rivals’ memory counterclaims. The longitudinal lens provides an insight into evolving intra-community tensions over memory, struggles between memory activists, and what is driving memory contestation post-Good Friday Agreement.
Disclosure statement
No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).
Notes
1 NI Statistics and Research Agency – https://www.ninis2.nisra.gov.uk/public/AreaProfileReportViewer.aspx? FromAPAddressMulipleRecords = Ardoyne@Exact%20match%20of%20location%20name:%20@Exact%20Ma tch%20Of%20Location%20Name:%20%20Ardoyne@4?
2 Gilmartin (Citation2022) notes the violence of the 12th to 15th August 1969 witnessed some 3500 families displaced. As the violence intensified in the early 1970s, 11.8% of the population were forced to evacuate their homes in Belfast.
3 The peace lines or peace walls are a series of constructed barriers consisting of walls and gates at interfaces that separate Catholic/nationalist and Protestant/unionist communities.
4 The ACP was criticized for its partiality, that the unionist community in Glenbryn and unionist former Ardoyne residents’ voices were not included. A valid point addressed in a subsequent publication (Lundy & McGovern, Citation2005, pp. 67–78).
5 The Ulster Special Constabulary, commonly called the "B-Specials" or "B Men" was a quasi-military reserve special police force in NI, disbanded in May 1970. The Royal Ulster Constabulary was the police force in Northern Ireland from 1922 to 2001. As part of the reform implemented following the GFA, the RUC was renamed the Police Service of Northern Ireland.
6 Interview, memory activist, 10 April 2022.
7 Ex-POW refers to ex-prisoner of war.
8 Interview, memory activist, 10 April 2022.
9 The ABLHA committee was essentially ex-prisoners and republican activists.
10 We could not confirm if the woman’s family requested that her name should not be added to the memorial.
11 Interview with veteran community worker and memory activist, 4 May 2022.
12 Interview with memory activist (and member of ABLHA), 20 May 2022.
13 Interview with memory activist (and member of ABLHA), 20 May 2022.
14 Interview with memory activist (and member of ABLHA), 20 May 2022.
15 Interview with veteran community worker and memory activist, 4 May 2022.
16 Interview with veteran community worker and memory activist, 4 May 2022.
17 Battle over the dead’ is how one republican activist described the contestation over the past between republican mainstream and dissenting groups. Interview, republican memory activist, 29 April 2022.
18 Na Fianna Éireann, was a youth organisation founded by Bulmer Hobson and Countess Markieivicz in 1909. The Fianna, sought to play a part in ‘re-establishing the independence of Ireland through the training of the youth of Ireland, mentally and physically.
19 Interview with memory activist (and member of ABLHA), 20 May 2022; Interview, memory activist, 10 April 2022 and 29 April.
21 The Royal Ulster Constabulary (RUC) was the police force in Northern Ireland from 1922 to 2001. As part of the reform implemented following the GFA, the RUC was renamed the Police Service of Northern Ireland.
22 Interview, memory activist (and member of ABLHA), 20 May 2022., 29 April 2022; Interview with memory activist, 4 May 2022.
23 Interview, memory activist (and member of ABLHA), 20 May 2022, 29 April 2022; Interview with memory activist, 4 May 2022.
24 This is an ongoing project which began in 2017 and includes over thirty interviews from the Ardoyne community, participants range in age from those over the age of eighteen (who were born during the peace process, or after the Good Friday Agreement) to those who were born and remember life before the Troubles began.
25 Holy Cross Girls School dispute occurred in 2001–2002 in Ardoyne, North Belfast with members of the Protestant Unionist community of Glenbyrn protesting the Holy Cross Catholic school, claiming that Catholics were attacking their homes. The community tried to prevent the schoolgirls and their parents from walking to school through their area. The PSNI and British army were called in to escort the children and parents each day, the tensions often escalated with sectarian abuse, rocks, urine-filled balloons, and a blast bomb being thrown at the girls and their parents. This continued into 2002 until agreements were reached.
27 Lyra McKee was an investigative journalist who was fatally shot during rioting in the Creggan area of Derry on 18th April 2019.
Additional information
Notes on contributors
Eimear Rosato
Eimear Rosato, a PhD candidate in the department of History and School of Irish Studies at Concordia University, Montreal/ Tiohtià:ke, Canada. Originally from Belfast, her research focuses on intergenerational memory in Northern Ireland, using the methodological approaches of Oral History. She is the 2022 inaugural winner of the John and Pat Hume Fellowship in association with ACIS.
Patricia Lundy
Patricia Lundy is Professor of Sociology at Ulster University. Her research has focused on dealing with the legacy of the NI conflict, ‘truth’ recovery, politics of memory, and historical instructional abuse. She has researched both community-based ‘truth’ recovery processes, police-led historical conflict-related investigations, redress, and institutional abuse inquiries. Her work has been published in a wide range of peer-reviewed academic journals; she is recipient of a Leverhulme Trust Major Research Fellowship and British Academy Senior Research Fellowship.