Thursday 13th to Saturday 15th June 2019
Public Records Office Northern Ireland (PRONI) and Queen’s University Belfast
Thursday 13th June (PRONI)
| 8.45-9.00 | Arrival and welcome |
| 9.00-9.10 | Introductory remarks – Michael Willis, Director and Deputy Keeper of the Records, and Gillian Allmond |
| 9.10-10.30 | Session 1: Prisons Memory Archive Lorraine Dennis, Queen’s University Belfast Introduction to the Prisons Memory Archive Kate Keane, Queen’s University Belfast Archiving Conflict: Challenges and opportunities of cataloguing the PMA Collection Laney Lennox, University of Ulster What role do archives play in societal participation in the peace process? Sarah McDonagh, Queen’s University Belfast Creating Access to the Prisons Memory Archive Video Tours: Challenges and opportunities |
| 10.30-10.50 | Tea break |
| 10.50-11.50 | Session 2: Institutional lives through the archives Pauline Prior, Queen’s University Belfast (retired) Hospital or Prison? Central Criminal Lunatic Asylum for Ireland, Dundrum Brett Irwin, PRONI Throwing the Book at the Records: Voices from the Prison archives in PRONI Jayne Hutchinson, PRONI and Michelle Kelly, PRONI Understanding patient/inmate experiences through Board of Guardians and Asylum records in PRONI |
| 11.50-1.10 | Session 3: Institutional lives: art, craft and poetry Alison Lowry, Artist The Art of Remembering: the role of artwork in an emotional history of institutions James Ward, University of Ulster Writing the Asylum: Literary lives and after lives Erin Hinson, Abbey Research Craftwork, Cooperation, and Community: Loyalist handicrafts and welfare in the Maze/Long Kesh compound prison system Robert Niblock, Writer and Ex-Prisoner The practice of creativity in a prison environment |
| 1.10-1.50 | Lunch |
| 1.50-3.10 | Session 4: Health and Mortality in the Institution I Emer Dennehy, Archaeologist From incarcerator to saviour: Richmond Penitentiary and the cholera epidemic of 1832 Michelle McCann, Queen’s University Belfast ‘Swarming with vermin’: Investigating and managing inmate death at the gaol (1846-52) Aoife Bhreatnach, Independent Researcher Without a friend to mourn or cry: institutional burials in Cork city 1860-1950 Michael Robinson, University of Liverpool Forgotten Fatalities of the Great War: Irish asylums during the First World War, 1914- 1918 |
| 3.10-3.40 | Tea break |
| 3.40-5.00 | Session 5: Health and Mortality in the Institution II Georgina Laragy,Trinity College, Dublin Workhouse burial grounds 1847-2019: historyand continuing significance Jennifer Pope, Mary Immaculate College, Limerick A “disastrous outbreak”: The 1908 Food Poisoning Epidemic at Mount St Vincent’s Orphanage, Limerick Patricia Marsh, PRONI ‘Sleepy sickness spreads’: encephalitis lethargica in Belfast Ruari-Santiago McBride, University of Limerick Contemporary prison healthcare reforms in the north of Ireland |
| 5.00-6.00 | Keynote speaker – Dr Olwen Purdue, Queen’s University Belfast Reframing welfare institutions: the workhouse in Irish urban life 1850-1914 |
| 7.00-9.00 | Drinks Reception and tour at Clifton House |
| 9.oo till late | Drinks at Sunflower bar |
Friday 14th June (PRONI)
| 9.00-10.20 | Session 6: Institutional Landscapes and Buildings Patrick Quinlan, Architect The landscapes of Ireland’s pauper lunatic asylums Gillian Allmond, Queen’s University Belfast Bringing down the asylum walls: buildings and landscapes at Purdysburn, Belfast (1902-1913) Arlene Crampsie, University College Dublin Life at the edge: geographies of institutional landscapes in 19th Century Ireland Glynn Kelso, PRONI Landscapes to confine and discourage: institutional buildings on the Ordnance Survey map |
| 10.20-10.40 | Tea Break |
| 10.40-12.00 | Session 7: Womens’ Lives and the Institution Grainne Blair, Independent Researcher Aspects of the Salvation Army in Ireland, 1880-1980: A different Institutional ‘Care Model’ Elaine Farrell, Queen’s University Belfast ‘They are prison companions’: nineteenth- century imprisoned women’s relationships Bridget Keown, Northeastern University Boston Psychological effects of the Easter Rising on female patients admitted to Richmond Asylum Lucy Simpson-Kilbane, University of Liverpool ‘Are the girls free?’: Containing ‘fallen women’ in post-independence Ireland |
| 12.00-1.00 | Session 8: Institutions of confinement and care: ideal and reality Coleman Dennehy, University of Limerick The house of correction in seventeenth- century Ireland Triona Waters, University of Limerick Darwin’s Epileptic Idiot and the Irish District Lunatic Asylum, 1827-1887 Rita McCarthy, University of Limerick From Workhouse to Mother and Baby Home: a County Clare institution |
| 1.00 – 2.00 | Lunch |
| 2.00-3.20 | Session 9: Institutions as ‘Dark Heritage’ Erin Gibbons, Archaeologist Re-branding the Misery: Some Connemara examples Niamh NicGhabhann, University of Limerick World Within Walls: presenting the history of St Davnet’s Hospital within a local authority museum context Laura McAtackney, Aarhus University, Denmark The contemporary politics of activist research on Magdalene Laundries Chris Hamill, Architect The Case of Armagh Gaol: Northern Ireland’s prisons, heritage dissonance and contestation |
| 3.20-3.50 | Tea Break |
| 3.50-4.50 | Session 10: Engaging with voices from the institution Gareth Mulvenna, Independent researcher The Orange Cross, 1972-76: An oral and documentary history Dieter Reinisch, Universities of Vienna and Salzburg Uncovering archives: Combining oral history and private archives in researching Irish Republican prisoners in Portlaoise Prison, 1973-1985 Sean O’Connell, Queen’s University Belfast The oral historian as ‘insider’ and ‘outsider’: approaches to researching mother and baby homes and Magdalene laundries |
| 5.00-6.00 | Keynote speaker – Dr Catherine Cox, University College Dublin – ‘No easy escapes’: Prisons, healthcare and engaged history |
| 6.45-late | Evening tour of Crumlin Road Gaol followed by three course dinner |
Saturday 15th June (Elmwood Building, Queen’s University Belfast)
| 10.00-11.00 | Session 11: Religion, the State and Institutional voices Victoria Pearson, University College Cork ‘In my Father’s House are Many Rooms’: The foundation of Roman Catholic charitable institutions in eighteenth century Cork Sean Barden, Curator Armagh CountyMuseum Patient Voices at the Central Criminal Lunatic Asylum, Dundrum Olivia Frehill, Trinity College Dublin ‘Encourage and Reward Virtue and you Strike at the Heart of Vice’: The Catholic institutional response to the aged single female in Dublin 1836–1922 |
| 11.00-11.30 | Tea Break |
| 11.30-12.10 | Session 12: After the Institution Damien Brennan, Trinity College Dublin Family Care provision in post institutional Ireland Patrick Quinlan The future for Ireland’s former lunatic asylum buildings |
| 12.10-12.20 | Closing remarks – Triona Waters |
| 1.00-2.00 | Lunch |
| 2.00-5.00 | Post-conference walking tour (starting at Divis Tower) |
Institutions in Ireland Conference 2019 