Hidden Ireland, Public Sphere

Book excerpt: How did the political climate of "ancien régime" Ireland, with its colonial-style landlord system, its Penal Laws, and its total cultural segregation, give way to the mounting nationalist groundswell of the nineteenth century? This pilot study attempts to sidestep ingrained and outworn debates, and argues that Irish developments around 1800 can be fruitfully studied in the light of historical models elaborated for Continental Europe. Between 1780 and 1830 a cultural transfer took place from native, Gaelic-speaking Ireland to urban academic and professional circles, and between 1820 and 1850 the Catholic part of the population came to appropriate Ireland's public sphere.