Vexatious Bodies in Modern Ireland by Deirdre Quinn
Total Page：16
File Type：pdf, Size：1020Kb
Vexatious Bodies in Modern Ireland by Deirdre Quinn A major thesis presented as full requirement for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in Media Studies National University of Ireland, Maynooth School of English, Media and Theatre Studies, Faculty of Arts, Celtic Studies & Philosophy 29th February 2012 Head of Department: Professor Chris Morash Supervisor: Professor Chris Morash Summary This dissertation examines discourses of the body in modern Ireland. It explores the development of official structures shaping the body, the habitus and ethos and the problematic disruptions of the body in nineteenth and twentieth-century Ireland. Official structures provided the scaffolding around which ideals of Irishness wrapped themselves. In locating the official body within these ideals, this thesis argues that problematic or “vexatious” bodies irritated dominant structures at the point where formative expectations of conservative Catholic morality, middle class respectability and the state meet. In a cycle of containment, these formations excluded the vexatious from recognition within dominant structures. While periodic outbursts of the vexatious pressurised official structures, the hegemonic expansion and contraction of official discourses returned it to a space beyond the parameters of dominant discourses, illustrated through examples involving infanticide and the tubercular body. The structural capacity to maintain dominance was dependent for its continuation on partial modernisation. Changes in the second half of the twentieth century contributed to the destabilisation of the dominant attitudes and structures. The thesis examines these changes and the impact of outbursts of the vexatious in the 1980s through a theoretical lens drawing on the theories of Michel Foucault, Judith Butler, Gilles Deleuze and Félix Guattari. The thesis also analyses print media, focussing on national broadsheets, The Irish Times, The Irish Independent and The Irish Press and magazines, Hot press, In Dublin, The Phoenix and Magill and television drama, The Spike (1978), along with influential current affairs programs Today Tonight (1985/1987) and The Late Late Show (1987), providing a context for the examination of the emergence of the AIDS body as one that forced Irish society to confront what it had excluded and acted as a catalyst for accelerated medicalisation and in turn modernisation. Ultimately, AIDS forced Irish society to turn and look. Table of Contents Acknowledgements .............................................................................................. i Introduction: Contentious Bodies and their Discourses .................................. 1 Chapter One Locating the Body ............................................................................................ 26 Chapter Two Bodies, Structures and Institutions ................................................................. 54 Chapter Three Disruptions: Infanticide and the Tubercular Body ........................................ 81 Chapter Four Bodies, Ireland and Modernisation............................................................... 141 Chapter Five Offensive Bodies in The Spike (1978) ............................................................ 199 Chapter Six “French Letters”: Discourses of AIDS, Modernisation, Medicalisation and The Late Late Show ....................................................................................... 242 Conclusion: Turning the Body Inside Out ................................................... 295 Bibliography .................................................................................................. 306 Acknowledgements Firstly, I would like to thank my supervisor Professor Chris Morash for the enthusiasm he has shown for this project. His guidance, time, advice and insights have been invaluable. I am also indebted to Professor Margaret Kelleher and Dr. John Keating who provided a research space in An Foras Feasa and fostered a supportive work, research and learning environment. The support of Laura Gallagher and Gemma Middleton is also much appreciated. Staff of the School of English, Media and Theatre Studies at NUIM have provided advice throughout this process. I would like to thank our postgraduate co-ordinator Dr. Conor McCarthy, teaching mentor Dr. Colin Graham and all of the lecturers. Thanks also to Amanda Bent, Anne Byrne, Maura Hennelly, Ann McStravick and Tracy O’ Flaherty. Particular thanks go to Dr. Michael Cronin for his friendship, support and lively conversation. I would also like to thank Dr. Sinead Kennedy, Dr. Kylie Jarrett and Dr. Denis Condon. I gratefully acknowledge the support and encouragement of Dr. Alison Farrell at the Centre for Teaching and Learning and Dr. Sharon Tighe Mooney for her friendship and advice. Sincere thanks to the staff of the National Library of Ireland, the NUIM Library, the Russell Library, the Ordnance Survey of Ireland and the RTÉ Archives. Vicky Moran and Shane Caffrey at the RTÉ Archives have been particularly helpful. I would also like to thank the staff of Beaufort College and especially Pat Marley and Janet Brooks for their conversations and much valued friendship. Special thanks go to my fellow postgraduates and friends in the research space of An Foras Feasa and in the School of English, Media and Theatre Studies. I would like to mention Gráinne ni Bhreitiún and Barbara Strahan, Dr. Maggie O’ Neill, Dr. Ciara Gallagher, Jessica Peart, Declan Kavanagh, Sarah Byrne, Alan Carmody, Sonia Howell, Theresah Harney, Paul Donnelly, Claire i Brophy, Mark Tyndall and Mary O’ Byrne. Thanks also to Catriona Duffy at ICARUS. Particular thanks go to Dr. Eoghan Smith for his unfailing friendship and support throughout this process. I would like to thank my dear and old friends Niamh and Garret Coady, Jenny O’ Connor, Jean McArdle, Andy Power, Billy Gannon and Niall McGarthy. I am more than indebted to Liz Carr, Maeve Nic Samhradáin, Sinead Ryan and Trish and Ronan Crumlish who have always been on hand with support, hilarious witticisms and enduring friendship. Many, many thanks go to my aunt Mary, my siblings and their partners: Kevin, Padraic, Dermot, Enda, Lisa, Áine and Ciara. Finally, my largest debt is to my parents, Patricia and Kevin, whose love and support never fails. ii Introduction: Contentious Bodies and Their Discourses 1 The body has occupied a contentious space in Irish political, social and cultural life during the last and the previous century. In the twentieth century it has been celebrated by Joyce, interrogated by Beckett, revered by William Orpen, cut like jewels by Harry Clarke, satirised by Flann O’Brien and cast in a shift by JM Synge. The previous century also saw the body take a central position within the artistic and literary consciousness of Irish society. Wilde’s Salomé emphasised the body’s physicality while Gearld Griffith’s novel The Collegians provided the basis for Dion Bouciault’s The Colleen Bawn, the plot of which is driven by the iconic recovery of the murdered body of a young bride from the sea. These articulations, amongst several others, all contributed to the visibility of the body within the public sphere. While they belong to what may be considered the elitist realms of art and literature, each articulation exists as part of a broader culture rather than as isolated aesthetic expression. Rich, exuberant, sensuous, sinful, injured, hurt, defiled, austere and humorous bodies; each one illuminates the sometimes veiled and sometimes obvious contradictions of the body that characterise its reception in Irish public life. Other forms of communication and expression have also exhibited the same conflicts in relation to the body. These contradictions, what constitutes them and their expression in public forums and, specifically within the print and broadcast media in Ireland, are the central concerns of this thesis. Within recent scholarship there has been a significant amount of work that has discussed the body in relation to Irish Studies. While this work will be explored later, at this point it might be useful to clarify what is meant here by the body. For the purpose of this research the body will be defined as a biological and cultural system that occupies both a physical and an abstract space. Neither space exists autonomously; rather they are codependent. Furthermore, each one is defined through discourses that interact across those spaces. The discourses through which those systems find their expression in language have emerged from shared cultural, political and social understandings. Consequently, the contours of language delineate a body that is acceptable within the parameters of a shared system of language and shared values. That body is then, through the power of shared discourses, perpetuated across society and 2 vertically through hierarchical social, political and cultural structures. Power is inscribed in, on and through the space of the body; however, that power emanates from the momentum that builds around accepted official discourses and the binding they administer to disparate social groups. The power of shared discourse reinforces abstract and physical structures across society which in turn gives rise to the growth of a monoglottic lens of perception. A monoglottic lens of perception is defined here as a perception cut from prevailing social, political and cultural ideas which are then expressed through one accepted and shared discourse. Continued consensus around this discourse and participation of the majority in it