The present study investigates how attendees at national celebratory crowd events-specifically St. Patrick's Day parades-understand the role of such events in representing and uniting the national community. We conducted semi-structured interviews with people who attended St. Patrick's Day parades in either Dublin or Belfast. In year 1, full-length interviews were conducted before and after the events (N = 17), and in years 1 and 2, shorter interviews were conducted during the events (year 1 N = 170; year 2 N = 142). Interview data were analysed using thematic analysis, allowing the identification of three broad themes. Participants reported that (i) the events extend the boundary of the national group, using participation to define who counts as Irish; (ii) the events strategically represent the nature of the national group, maximising positive images and managing stereotypical representations; and (iii) symbolism serves to unify the group but can also disrupt already fragile unity and so must be managed. Overall, this points to a strategic identity dimension to these crowd events. We discuss the implications of these findings for future research in terms of the role of large-scale celebratory events in the strategic representation of everyday social identities.
Accepted 7 March 2015This is an open access article under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits use, distribution and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited. Fenton, 2007). In such settings, overt displays of 'hot' nationalism are something we associate with others (Billig, 1995)-for example, those that have a troubled national history or those within our own national group that have questionable national credentials (Stevenson & Muldoon, 2010). Nationalism is often seen as something exclusive and divisive, leading to discrimination against minorities within the nation and conflict between nations (Brubaker, 1999;Croucher, 2003;Fenton, 2007). As such, talking or acting up one's national authenticity can be counterproductive, allowing accusations of bigotry, of subscribing to 'the wrong kind' of nationalism and of displaying an 'over-heated reaction' (Billig, 1995, p. 37).
2012;One interesting exception to the rule against overt displays of national identity pertains to when nations celebrate and commemorate through parades or rituals attended by large crowds-as nearly all countries do. Here, demonstrations of national identity are acceptable and have a 'taken for granted' quality. This acceptability may come from the fact that such events are assumed to unite the many diverse elements of the nation. They are often carefully managed by state organisations to produce unity, and the sociological and psychological literature suggests that they are successful in doing so (Edensor, 2002; Páez, Rimé, Basabe, Wlodarczyk, & Zumeta, 2013, as cited in Páez & Rimé, 2014Pehrson, Stevenson, Muldoon, & Reicher, 2014). We argue that although collective events involve actively waving flags or pai...