Commemorating Partition and Civil Wars in Ireland, 2020-2023

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This is an application for follow-on funding for impact and engagement to build upon the successful research network 'Northern Ireland's 2016: Approaching the contested commemoration of the Easter Rising and the Battle of the Somme'. It seeks to fill a void in exchanging academic knowledge with policy-makers in Northern Ireland who are struggling to implement the aspects of the Stormont House Agreement dealing with the legacy of the past. It will do so by drawing attention to the significance of the longer term causes of political and ethnic conflict dating from partition and the creation of Northern Ireland (1920-21).It offers academics from a range of AHSS disciplines an opportunity to engage with policy makers, cultural and heritage institutions and voluntary organisations to address the most serious challenges facing commemoration in Northern Ireland during the Irish Decade of Centenaries:- the partition of Ireland, establishing a devolved administration in Northern Ireland and an effectively independent state in the south (that would become a republic in 1949). Partition is seen by unionists as a quintessential state-building moment and remains central to much of unionist and especially loyalist identity in Northern Ireland, whereas to many nationalists and republicans it was the ultimate act of betrayal that left them at the mercy of a unionist majority government that denied them essential civil rights for over fifty years;- sectarian violence in Northern Ireland between 1920 and 1922, including the expulsion of Catholic workers from the Belfast shipyards, the burning of Catholic businesses in Lisburn in 1920, and the sectarian killings of the McMahons and at Altnaveigh in 1922;- the Irish Civil War (1922-1923) and the way in which efforts to prevent a split in the IRA involved a campaign to destabilise the new Northern Ireland government.Commemorations of these events will be complicated by the coincidence of the fiftieth anniversary of the Troubles (from c.2018 onwards).The project responds directly to three recent developments that have emerged since the original grant:- 'The Stormont House Agreement (2014)': by highlighting the significance of events surrounding partition and the establishment of Northern Ireland in 1921 in fulfilling the SHA's remit of a producing 'a factual historical timeline and statistical analysis of the Troubles'.- 'A Fresh Start' (November 2015): The SHA implementation plan that indicates clearly the difficulties being encountered in dealing with legacy issues.- The Behaviours and Attitudes 'Ireland's Call' poll (October 2015) which highlighted a low level of public knowledge in Northern Ireland about the impact of key historical events from the period. A seminar to the NI Assembly's Knowledge Exchange series will disseminate the outcomes to policy-makers in NI.A podcasted public lecture series will seek to bridge the gap between the existing academic literature and the public awareness of it.Two policy symposiums will offer academics from a wide range of AHSS disciplines (anthropology, education, English literature, geography, history, Irish studies, memory studies, politics) an opportunity to share their expertise with policy makers, cultural institutions and third sector groups concerned with organising commemorative events, and improving community relations in Northern Ireland and between Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland, including:National Government: Northern Ireland Office, Irish Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade (Anglo-Irish Division);Devolved Government: Office of First Minister and Deputy First Minister; Department of Culture, Arts and Leisure; Department of Education Northern Ireland;Local Government: Belfast City Council; Third sector: Community Relations Council, Healing Through Remembering, Co-operation Ireland, the Nerve Centre.