Brave enough to fight? Masculinity, migration and the Irish revolution

Abstract

This article focuses on the nationalist side in revolutionary Ireland (1912–23), examining concepts of bravery, heroic masculinity, fighting for principles and country, all of which have important impacts on understandings of masculinities during the time period (and indeed before and beyond it). Contemporary nationalist rhetoric emphasised the need to rally all men for an armed struggle: such language paid no heed to the economic realities of many families in Ireland that still needed adult children to migrate. Historians of this period have done much to uncover the contributions of various groups, but they have rarely examined the gendered ideologies surrounding men in this period, nor have they taken on board the insights from international histories of violence, war and revolution that have interrogated militaristic forms of masculinity in other countries.