UNIT 4 - IRELAND

The meaning of art

#004

ART & POWER

From songs to poems, from myths to legends...

STAIR NA HÉIREANN

DISCOVERING IRELAND THROUGH SONGS AND POEMS

A multitude of stories

In this fourth unit we will dive into Ireland's history through songs and poems. Be prepared to enter a world of wonders and enchantment; to discover a nation through the eye and words of poets and singers; to embrace its culture and rich history and make it your own in a matter of weeks.

Ireland is the home of the Celts, and the cradle of many myths, legends, songs and stories in general. An enchanting land which inspired many poets and singers to dive in its Emerald green.

+more to come next class

A bloody history

Ireland and its symbols

Four-leaf clovers, leprechauns and their gold, fairies and old kings: Irish history is full of wonders.

Despite its heavenly appearance, Irish history was written in blood and conflicts.

ART & POWER

Discovering Ireland and its history through songs and poems

01

02

03

The Beauty

The Troubles

The Famine

Poem:W.B. Yeats • The Lake Isle of Innisfree

Song:U2 • Sunday Bloody Sunday

Poem: Eavan Boland • Quarantine

04

05

06

The Famine II

The Country

The Laundries

Song: Sinead O'Connor • Famine

Poem:Charles Kickham • The Irish Peasant Girl

Poem:Joni Mitchell • The Magdalene Laundries

07

08

The Laundries II

The Exam

Song: Joni Mitchell • The Magdalene Laundries

Art:Express yourself

INTRODUCTION TO IRELAND

THE BEAUTY

'I will arise and go now, and go to Innisfree,And a small cabin build there, of clay and wattles made; Nine bean-rows will I have there, a hive for the honey-bee, And live alone in the bee-loud glade.'

→ W.B. YEATS • THE LAKE ISLE OF INNISFREE

Today's class:

Brainstorming & Sharing

Within your groups take turns to share everything you know about Ireland. Just like we did with New Zealand, every information matters and will add to the class' knowledge.

Reading William Butler Yeats' poem, find more information about Ireland, specifically its beauty, nature and landscape.

→ OUR MINDMAP

U2 - Sunday, Bloody Sunday

THE TROUBLES

I can't believe the news today,Oh I can't close my eyes and make it go awayHow long, how long must we sing this song?How long, how long?'Cause tonight, we can be as one tonightBroken bottles under children's feetBodies strewn across the dead-end streetBut I won't heed the battle callIt puts my back up against the wallSunday, Bloody Sunday... (x4)And the battle's just begunThere's many lost, but tell me who has won?The trenches dug within our heartsAnd mothers, children, brothers, sisters torn apartSunday, Bloody Sunday... (x2)How long, how long must we sing this song?How long, how long?'Cause tonight, we can be as one tonightSunday, Bloody Sunday... (x2)

Wipe the tears from your eyes,Wipe your tears awayOh, wipe your tears away,Oh, wipe your tears awaySunday, Bloody SundayOh, wipe your bloodshot eyesSunday, Bloody Sunday... (x5)And it's true we are immuneWhen fact is fiction and TV realityAnd today the millions cry Sunday, Bloody SundayWe eat and drink while tomorrow they die Sunday, Bloody SundayThe real battle just begun Sunday, Bloody SundayTo claim the victory Jesus won Sunday, Bloody SundayOn... Sunday, Bloody SundaySunday, Bloody Sunday... (x2)

→ Sunday, Bloody Sunday - Live in London

Bloody Sunday

The Troubles

The Troubles were a conflict in Northern Ireland that lasted about 30 years from the late 1960s to 1998.Ireland is divided in two, the Independant Republic of Ireland in the south, and the British nation of Ulster (Northern Ireland) in the north.Ireland is a mostly Catholic country, while Ulster is mostly Protestant. The conflict was started by the different sides wanting to either join Ireland or remain in the United Kingdom.During the conflict, more than 3500 people died and 47000 were injured.

Bloody Sunday was a massacre that took place on 30 January 1972 in Derry, Northern Ireland, United Kingdom. British soldiers shot 26 unarmed civilians during a protest march. Fourteen died. Many of the victims were shot while running from the soldiers.In 2010, British Prime Minister David Cameron apologised on behalf of the British Government by saying he was 'deeply sorry', and describing what British soldiers had done as 'both unjustified and unjustifiable'.

THE FAMINE

Eavan Boland - Quarantine

→ Learn about the Famine and how it started

A Famine monument in Ireland

Poet Eavan Boland

In the morning they were both found dead.Of cold. Of hunger. Of the toxins of a whole history. But her feet were held against his breastbone.The last heat of his flesh was his last gift to her. Let no love poem ever come to this threshold. There is no place here for the inexact praise of the easy graces and sensuality of the body. There is only time for this merciless inventory:

In the worst hour of the worst seasonof the worst year of a whole people a man set out from the workhouse with his wife. He was walking - they were both walking - north. She was sick with famine fever and could not keep up He lifted her and put her on his back. He walked like that west and west and north. Until at nightfall under freezing stars they arrived.

Their death together in the winter of 1847.Also what they suffered. How they lived. And what there is between a man and woman. And in which darkness it can best be proved.

→ Quarantine, read and briefly explained by Eavan Boland

The Famine and its consequences

The Great Famine was a period of starvation due to lack of food, and disease in Ireland in the mid 19th century. It is known in Irish as 'An Drochshaol' - The Hard Times. The worst year was 1847, now known as 'Black 47'. It was caused by a blight (disease) of the potato crops. As potatoes was the major food source of the island, the consequences were dire. During the Famine more than 1 million Irish died and an other million emigrated abroad. All in all, the population of Ireland dropped by around 25%. The Famine caused a lot of tensions between Ireland and the United Kingdom, whom the Irish thought responsible. Moreover, as the Famine hit the regions where the Irish language was dominant the hardest, it resulted in a huge decline of the Irish language use in the country.

A potato affected by the blight

A normal potato

THE FAMINE

Sinead O'Connor - Famine

So let's take a look, shall we?The highest statistics of child abuse in the EEC, and we say we're a Christian country. But we've lost contact with our history, See, we used to worship God as a mother, we're suffering from post-traumatic-stress disorder Look at all our old men in the pubs Look at all our young people on drugs We used to worship God as a mother Now look at what we're doing to each other We've even made killers of ourselves, the most child-like trusting people in the UniverseAnd this is what's wrong with us Our history books, the parent figures lied to us.I see the Irish as a race like a child that got itself bashed in the face And if there ever is gonna be healing There has to be remembering And then grieving So that there then can be forgiving There has to be knowledge And understanding

All desperate attempts at running And in its worst form becomes actual killing And if there ever is gonna be healing There has to be remembering And then grieving So that there then can be forgiving There has to be knowledge And understanding An American Army regulation says you mustn't kill more than 10 % of a nation'Cause to do so causes permanent 'psychological damage'It's not permanent, but they didn't know thatAnyway, during the supposed FamineWe lost a lot more than 10% of our nationThrough deaths on land or on ships of emigrationBut what finally broke us was not starvation, but its use in the controlling of our education Schools go on about 'Black 47' On and on about 'the terrible Famine' But what they don't say is In truth, there never really was one

Okay, I want to talk about IrelandSpecifically I want to talk about the 'Famine' About the fact that there never really was one There was no 'Famine', see Irish people were only allowed to eat potatoes All of the other food, meat, fish, vegetables Were shipped out of the country Under armed guard to England While the Irish people starved And then in the middle of all this They gave us money Not to teach our children Irish And so we lost our history And this is what I think is still hurting me See, we're like a child that's been battered Has to drive itself out of its head Because it's frightened Still feels all the painful feelings But they lose contact with the memory And this leads to massive self-destruction Alcoholism, drug addiction

Singer, songwriter Sinead O'Connor

Sinéad O'Connor was born in Ireland in 1966. She is an engaged artist who often talks about religion, war and abuses. The song Famine was part of her 1994 album Universal Mother.

→ Famine Live

All the lonely people, where do they all come from?All the lonely people, where do they all belong?

Irish landscape - The beauty of the Emerald Isle, its cliffs, its castles and its deep blue water → tourismireland.com

THE COUNTRY

Charles Kickham - The Irish Peasant Girl

She lived beside the Anner,At the foot of Slievna-man, A gentle peasant girl, With mild eyes like the dawn; Her lips were dewy rosebuds; Her teeth of pearls rare; And a snow-drift 'neath a beechen bough Her neck and nut-brown hair. How pleasant 'twas to meet her On Sunday, when the bell Was filling with its mellow tones Lone wood and grassy dell And when at eve young maidens Strayed the river bank along, The widow's brown-haired daughter Was loveliest of the throng.

O brave, brave Irish girls-We well may call you brave!- Sure the least of all your perils Is the stormy ocean wave, When you leave our quiet valleys, And cross the Atlantic's foam, To hoard your hard-won earnings For the helpless ones at home. 'Write word to m own dear mother- Say, we'll meet with God above; And tell my little brothers I send them all my love; May the angels ever guard them, Is their dying sister's prayer" And folded in a letter Was a braid of nut-brown hair.

Ah, cold and well-nigh callous,This weary heart has grown For thy helpless fate, dear Ireland, And for sorrows of my own; Yet a tear my eye will moister, When by Anner side I stray, For the lily of the mountain foot That withered far away.

→ The Irish Peasant Girl put in music

An Irish Lily

THE LAUNDRIES

Joni Mitchell - The Magdalene Laundries

Peg O'Connell died todayShe was a cheeky girl, a flirt They just stuffed her in a hole Surely to God you'd think at least Some bells should ring One day I'm going to die here too And they'll plant me in the dirt Like some lame bulb That never blooms come any spring Not any spring No, not any spring Not any spring

Prostitutes and destitutesAnd temptresses like me Fallen women Sentenced into dreamless drudgery Why do they call this heartless place Our Lady of Charity? Oh Charity These bloodless brides of Jesus If they'd just once glimpsed their groom Then they would know And they would drop the stones Concealed behind their rosaries They wilt the grass they walk upon They leech the light out of the room They'd like to drive us down the drain At the Magdalene Laundries

I was an unmarried girl,I'd just turned twenty-seven When they sent me to the sisters For the way men looked at me Branded as a Jezebel I knew I was not bound for Heaven I'd be cast in shame Into the Magdalene Laundries Most girls come here pregnant Some by their own fathers Bridget got that belly By her parish priest We're trying to get things white as snow All of us woebegotten daughters In the steaming stains Of the Magdalene Laundries

Singer, songwriter Joni Mitchell

Joni Mitchell was born in Canada in 1943. She started her carreer in 1964 and is regarded as 'one of the greatest songwriters ever'. The song Magdalene Laundries was part of her 1994 album 'Turbulent Indigo'

→ Magdalene Laundries Live

→ Teaser for 'The Magdalene Sisters' movie

→ Magdalene Survivors telling their stories (4 minutes)

'Fallen women' working in a Magdalene Laundry

What were the Magdalene Laundries?

Around 30,000 women were confined in the Laundries, a lot of them died there. In 1993, at the Sisters of Our Lady of Charity, unmarked graves of 155 women and babies were found. This caused a big scandal which helped close the last Magdalene Laundry.In 2013, the Prime Minister apologised on behalf of the Irish government and described the laundries as 'the nation's shame', and £50 million compensation was set up for survivors of the laundries.

The Magdalene Laundries were religious institutions that operated from 1767 to 1996 in Ireland. They were the houses of 'Fallen Women', this term was used to describe prostitutes, young women who became pregnant outside of marriage, or young girls and teenagers who did not have familial support. They were required to work for the sisters (nuns) and did not get paid for it. The name laundry refers to the women's work, they had to clean clothes, whitening them using dangerous products.

FINAL TASK

SAYING

WRITING

Being convincing

Finding inspiration

When you recite a poem or sing a song, your audience has to feel what you say. It's not like talking about what you did this weekend, You have to show emotions, you have to show that you care about what you're saying.To deliver your poem or your song perfectly, you will need to: Take care of your pronunciation'I am not asking you to have a perfect accent, but to try to pronounce things correctly)Make pauses (they're important!)Use tones and intonation to express different things.

During this unit, we studied songs and poems. You have seen how they were written. In stanzas, with rhymes, etc.But what matters most if meaning, the message and the beauty of what you say are the keys.To succeed you will need:To write a song or a poem about IrelandTo use your knowledge of the country and what we learnt during the unit. To be inspired and inspiring ! Your text may be a joyful piece, or a protest piece, it's all up to you !

Good luck!

Good luck!