Religion, Class and Identity

Book excerpt: This book examines the experience of the Irish Catholic working class and their descendants in Britain as a minority experience which has been profoundly shaped by the responses of both the British state and the Catholic church to Irish migrants. The book challenges notions that the Irish have smoothly assimilated to British society and demonstrates how the reception and policies that greeted the Irish in 19th century Britain created the framework within which the experiences of Irish migrants to Britain in the 20th century have been formed. Research about the education of Irish Catholics is used to investigate how a labour migrant group who, in the 19th century were large, visible and problematized were socially constructed as invisible by the mid-20th century through a process of incorporation and denationalization.