City walls, bathroom stalls and tweeting the Taoiseach: the aesthetics of protest and the campaign for abortion rights in the Republic of Ireland

NicGhabhann, Niamh

doi:10.1080/10304312.2018.1468413

Cited by 15 publications

(6 citation statements)

References 17 publications

Supporting

Mentioning

Contrasting

Order By: Relevance

“…We also engaged with purposeful sampling, because the texts/visuals offer insight into the discourses and ideologies underpinning the official and more prominent ‘No’ campaigns, as manifested in public spaces. Our interest is in the public external visual/textual communications of the campaigns, and thus the analysis is not grounded in the aesthetics of pro-choice campaigns (see NicGhabhann, 2018; O’Hara, 2020). Rather, using a heteroactivist analytics, we focus on the rhetoric and invocation of the mutual constitution of nation and politics through which the ‘No’ campaigns sought to reiterate a particular form of heteronormativity.…”

Section: Visual and Textual Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Ireland offers a rich context in which to explore abortion politics. Indeed, these politics have been extensively discussed (see for example Smyth, 1992, 1998; Gilmartin and White, 2011; Quilty, Kennedy and Conlon, 2016; McAuliffe and Kennedy, 2017; de Londras and Enright, 2018; NicGhabhann, 2018). A full analysis of this literature is beyond the scope of this article.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…The visual and textual ephemera from the recent ‘No’ campaign in the 2018 abortion referendum in Ireland offer insights into the geographies of abortion politics (for analyses of the Repeal campaign, see NicGhabhann, 2018; O’Hara, 2020). Rather than analyse social media or other sources, this article focuses on some of the visual material produced by those who opposed Repeal and that appeared prominently in everyday public spaces throughout Ireland.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

See 2 more Smart Citations

In Ireland We ‘Love Both’? Heteroactivism in Ireland’s Anti-Repeal Ephemera

Browne¹,

Nash²

2020

Feminist Review

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Resistances to sexual and gender rights are shifting and need new theorisations. This article develops the analytical concept of heteroactivism by exploring its relation to abortion debates in Ireland. Heteroactivism as an analytical category examines resistances to sexual and gender rights that seek to reiterate the place of the heteronormative family (both in terms of gender norms and heterosexuality) through activisms that can stand against new legislative orders. The article investigates three texts to explore how the ‘Vote No’ campaign in Ireland discussed ‘loving both’, but in the main thrust of the poster campaign instead focused on the foetus as an ‘unborn child’. Using textual and visual analysis, we show the creation of Ireland through seeking to ‘love both’ and create a distinction from the dangers, and foreign contagion, of England. The article concludes by arguing that ongoing work is needed to explore heteroactivism and its diverse manifestations, including in abortion debates.

show abstract

Section: Visual and Textual Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

See 1 more Smart Citation

In Ireland We ‘Love Both’? Heteroactivism in Ireland’s Anti-Repeal Ephemera

Browne¹,

Nash²

2020

Feminist Review

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

“…The Repeal movement used processions, protest and strikes to manifest dissensus in the streets (NicGhabhann, 2018). One month before the referendum vote, as part of the 38 th EVA International Festival, members of the Artists’ Campaign to Repeal the 8 th Amendment enacted a street procession in Limerick.…”

Section: The Aesthetics Of Politics: Women As Law’s Makersmentioning

confidence: 99%

Four Pieces on Repeal: Notes on Art, Aesthetics and the Struggle Against Ireland’s Abortion Law

Enright¹

2020

Feminist Review

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

The Repeal campaign articulated new and transformative relationships between law, reproduction and the political in Ireland. During the campaign, ordinary people took ownership of and participated in mutual teaching and critique of law on a wide scale. Art, along these lines, was often used to document and archive the injustices worked by the 8th Amendment. However, art also became a means of imagining law otherwise. In this piece, I use Jacques Rancière’s work on the relationship between aesthetics and politics to analyse artistic contributions to feminist legal discourses associated with Repeal.

show abstract

“…The role of the city and street protest in previous abortion campaigns was explored by Allen et al (2014). NicGhabhann's (2018 investigation of how the carnivalesque and the counter spectacle were deployed by abortion activists and artists between 2015 and 2017 looks at both public and virtual public spaces.…”

mentioning

confidence: 99%

Remediating Family Photography: Savita’s Image and the Campaign to Repeal the 8th Amendment

Fitzpatrick

2022

Feminist Encounters: A Journal of Critical Studies in Culture a

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

On 14 November 2012, this colour photographic portrait (see Figure 1) appeared on the front page of the Irish Times accompanying an article by Kitty Holland and Paul Cullen (Holland and Cullen, 2012: 1). It was the first time that the Irish public saw the face of Savita Halappanavar, a thirty-one year-old Indian national, who died of sepsis in a Galway hospital on 24 October. Seventeen weeks pregnant and miscarrying, she was denied a termination as a foetal heartbeat was present. Her case perfectly encapsulated the dilemma faced by medical practitioners dealing with Ireland's prohibition on abortion. When he appeared at her inquest, the former master of the National Maternity Hospital, Dr Peter Boylan, said that had she been given a termination on the day she was admitted (21 October) or the day after, 'on the basis of probabilities, Savita would still be alive (…) by the time Savita's condition worsened and termination became [legally] possible, it was too late to save her life' (McGee, 2013: 15). It is the trajectory of this vernacular portrait and its role in the years leading up to the successful campaign to Repeal the 8th Amendment to the Constitution in 2018 that this paper will explore, thus showing how a commonplace photograph was propelled into the public realm, making Savita an icon and shifting the visual field from the foetus to the woman. Following its publication, Savita was to become instantly recognisable, not just in Ireland but on an international platform. Holland pinpoints how Savita's photograph moved from the domestic to the public realm: Meanwhile I got in touch with another of Savita's friends in Galway, Mrdula Vaseali asking for any memories she might have of Savita and reminding her of the need for a photograph. 'If you have a good, clear close-up that would be great,' I said … Attached to the email was a jpeg, a photograph which Mrdula said she hoped would be OK. It was that photograph, the image that was to accompany the story of The Irish Times front page and travel around the world. A dazzlingly beautiful young woman,

show abstract

City walls, bathroom stalls and tweeting the Taoiseach: the aesthetics of protest and the campaign for abortion rights in the Republic of Ireland

Cited by 15 publications

References 17 publications

In Ireland We ‘Love Both’? Heteroactivism in Ireland’s Anti-Repeal Ephemera

In Ireland We ‘Love Both’? Heteroactivism in Ireland’s Anti-Repeal Ephemera

Four Pieces on Repeal: Notes on Art, Aesthetics and the Struggle Against Ireland’s Abortion Law

Remediating Family Photography: Savita’s Image and the Campaign to Repeal the 8th Amendment

Contact Info

Product

Resources

About