Rising: Reverence, Relevance, Revelry — Commemorations of the 1916 Rising in Dublin, Easter 2016

Abstract

This article describes an empirical study examining the official commemorations of the 1916 Easter Rising, held in Dublin on Easter Sunday, 27 March 2016. Through a combination of newspaper content analysis and empirical data, this study examines the process of generating what Mabel Berezin and Rogers Brubaker have termed ‘communities of feeling’. Analysis of newspaper content between September 2014 and March 2016 highlighted four main themes: (1) a belief that Ireland would have attained sovereignty even if the 1916 Rising had not happened; (2) the equivocal stance of the government towards celebrating the 1916 Rising, which throughout the Northern Ireland troubles habitually presented difficulties for the state; (3) comparisons between commemorating the centenary in 2016 and the jubilee in 1966; and (4) reflections on the purpose of commemorations, particularly the changed emphasis on the role played by women during the Rising as well as the inclusion of religious faiths other than the Catholic Church in such commemorations. The second section of the study provides an analysis of the commemorative events and the nature of contemporary Irish nationalism based on data collected using Non‐Participant Observation. Overall, the study seeks to understand the inter‐connections between nationalism, emotions and social action in the context of Irish nationalism as portrayed during the 1916 commemorations in Dublin.