Researching Memory & Identity in Mid
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'Whatever You Say, Say Nothing': Researching Memory & Identity in Mid-Ulster 1945-1969 Bryson, A. (2019). 'Whatever You Say, Say Nothing': Researching Memory & Identity in Mid-Ulster 1945-1969. Oral History, 50th - Special Anniversary Edition. https://www.ohs.org.uk/journal/ohj-50/ Published in: Oral History Document Version: Publisher's PDF, also known as Version of record Queen's University Belfast - Research Portal: Link to publication record in Queen's University Belfast Research Portal Publisher rights © Oral History Society 2019. This work is made available online in accordance with the publisher’s policies. Please refer to any applicable terms of use of the publisher. General rights Copyright for the publications made accessible via the Queen's University Belfast Research Portal is retained by the author(s) and / or other copyright owners and it is a condition of accessing these publications that users recognise and abide by the legal requirements associated with these rights. Take down policy The Research Portal is Queen's institutional repository that provides access to Queen's research output. Every effort has been made to ensure that content in the Research Portal does not infringe any person's rights, or applicable UK laws. If you discover content in the Research Portal that you believe breaches copyright or violates any law, please contact [email protected]. Download date:30. Sep. 2021 The Voice of History ‘Whatever you say, say nothing’1: Researching memory and identity in Mid-Ulster, 1945-1969 by Anna Bryson Vol 35, no 2, 2007, pp 45-56 The research described in persuaded me to turn my community interaction home town of Maghera. this article was conducted attention to the much and in variables such as The fixing of the for a PhD that I less scrutinised post- class, gender and timeframe at 1945- completed at Trinity World War Two period and political conflict. I needed 1969 was deliberately College Dublin in 2003. to set about conducting a site that would lend designed to test the I had originally planned to my own interviews. My itself to examination of authenticity of the much focus on a pre-existing initial objective was a the intersection of all vaunted notion of a pre- collection of interviews broad one – to write a these variables. The Troubles ‘golden age’. conducted with Ulster ‘from below’ history of this compelling logic of a As discussed in the veterans of the revolution period. As the work detailed local analysis – article, the fact that I and civil war period in evolved I became coupled with the was an ‘insider’ was a Ireland but my supervisor, increasingly interested in practicalities of access – key factor. I was initially the late David Fitzpatrick, the dynamics of cross- led me to focus on my reluctant to attempt a ORAL HISTORY @50 ‘Whatever you say, say nothing’: Researching memory and identity in Mid-Ulster, 1945-1969’ by Anna Bryson 2 cross-community study digitised thanks to the homes to me. The convinced of the but David insisted that I Save Our Sounds project) consent form was in importance of taking a should at least give it a are a unique record of many ways irrelevant – longer view. Indeed the go. He was right. It these individuals’ life and what was transacted was welcome news that this demanded agile and times. As chair of QUB their trust in me. Whilst article is to be re- tenacious footwork but Law School’s ethics there is nothing published has securing interviews with a committee, I spend quite particularly sensational encouraged me to think cross-section of men and a bit of time these days or provocative in the that this discrete study women from different pondering the potential content of the interviews might make a useful religious, social and negative consequences I know only too well that contribution to broader political backgrounds was of our work. Whilst I can’t a word out of place in a ‘dealing with the past’ more ‘doable’ than I say for certain that publication – the mere debates. My resolve thought. everyone I interviewed for hint of a slur on an stems both from renewed Although I wasn’t fully this project had a positive individual or their family – enthusiasm about the conscious of it at the experience I was greatly can generate grievances validity and interest of the time, the period in which I touched by the feedback that are nurtured for data and the sense that conducted the interviews that trickled through over generations. Indeed my own perhaps overly was significant. I definitely the years. In particular I revisiting this article prescriptive approach to benefitted from the ‘feel- was touched to learn that caused me to reflect on exposing personal oral good’ factor and one interviewee had died just how apt the title histories to the public is increased confidence peacefully in bed with a was. worthy of further generated by the peace copy of his transcript Unpicking the rationale reflection. In wrestling process and in particular beside him (his friend for this privileging of with my long-held instinct the signing of the 1998 later told me that it caution provokes wider to say nothing I Good Friday Agreement. meant so much to him questions about the role increasingly feel the In hindsight I think that that he kept it in the and place of history in responsibility to in fact say this was an important bedside locker). The post-conflict something – to give a ‘moment in time’ and I family of another communities. My voice to people who have am not sure that the interviewee read academic pathway has in effect asked for it by same project would be passages from his taken me in precisely consenting to be possible today. transcript at the funeral that direction – to work interviewed in the first Aside from changes in service – all reminders of on legacy issues in the place. The ongoing the local political climate, how important this work field of socio-legal challenge is, of course, to it is significant that eight can be to individuals and studies known as recognise and own our of the fourteen their families. ‘transitional justice’. As I editorial role as we interviewees have since There is of course a reflect on the broader attempt to balance passed away. None of downside. As someone context for writing and ethical obligations to our these individuals with a primal sense of rewriting the history of interviewees with the bequeathed diaries, this place and its people I Northern Ireland – for the pursuit of understanding memoirs or private felt a deep sense of negotiation, filtering and and meaning. papers and as such their accountability to the hijacking of individual Dr Anna Bryson, transcripts and voice individuals and families and collective memories School of Law, Queen’s recordings (now being that kindly opened their – I am increasingly University Belfast Abstract: The influence of collective memory on political identity in Ireland has been well documented. It has particular force in Northern Ireland where there is fundamental disagreement about how and why the conflict erupted and how it should be resolved. This article outlines some of the issues encountered by an ‘insider’ when attempting to record and analyse the conflicting memories of a range of Protestants and Catholics who grew up in Mid-Ulster in the decades preceding the Troubles. In particular, it considers the challenges and opportunities presented by a two-pronged approach to oral history: using testimony as evidence about historical experience in the past and as evidence about historical memory – both collective and individual – in the present. Keywords: Northern Ireland, insider, collective memory, individual memory ORAL HISTORY @50 ‘Whatever you say, say nothing’: Researching memory and identity in Mid-Ulster, 1945-1969’ by Anna Bryson 3 Political map of Northern Ireland, 2004. Although Northern Ireland is arguably ‘one of the most recorded. In order to document the shadings, contradictions heavily researched areas on earth’,2 relatively little has been and tensions within each testimony, I began to examine the written about the pre-Troubles period. A number of general context in which individuals departed from established histories span the period between the Second World War communal narratives. This paper presents some of the key and the outbreak of widespread violence in 1969 but there findings of my research and considers the particular oppor- are few micro-studies to account for the intense levels of tunities and challenges posed by this two-pronged approach sub-regional variation.3 Rather than adding to the body of to oral history research. By way of a backdrop, the first literature on political developments, I employed an oral section provides a brief overview of economic, political and history methodology to capture the experiences of a range social developments at both regional and local level. of individuals who grew up in the town of Maghera in the period 1945–1969.4 Economic development At one level these interviews were designed to provide Northern Ireland enjoyed an economic boom during the factual detail about the nature of society and politics at this Second World War. Industrial employment increased by 20 time. Such evidence was processed in much the same way per cent between 1941 and 1942 and agriculture benefited as any other source – it was carefully scrutinised for internal from the wartime priority given to the production of essential consistency and cross-checked with a range of other primary foods. By the mid-1950s, however, the prosperity had faded and secondary sources. As the interviews progressed, and employment generated by new enterprises provided however, I became increasingly interested in the manner in insufficient compensation for the numbers being laid off in which a range of Catholics5 and Protestants6 presented their traditional industries.