Women, Violence and Twentieth-Century Warfare

Linda Connolly is Full Professor of Sociology and Director of the Maynooth University Social Sciences Institute, Ireland. She has published widely in Ireland and internationally in the fields of Irish women’s studies, Irish feminism, the family, and social movements. Her books include The Irish Women’s Movement: From Revolution to Devolution (2003), The ‘Irish’ Family (Routledge, 2015) and Women and the Irish Revolution: Feminism, Activism, Violence (2021).

"As we commemorate the foundational period in our State's history, it is so important that we seek to do so with an ethical recall. We must, for example, include, as a priority, an examination of under-researched or avoided areas. Linda Connolly's book is an important reminder of what we must confront, acknowledge, and come to terms with. This includes difficult aspects of what were the informing elements of context of the independence struggle. It includes a consideration of the forms and sources of violence that emerged, were given expression, including the gradations of violence that were inflicted on women." Dr. Michael D. Higgins, Former President of Ireland“Linda Connolly is that rare breed of writer – she marries intellectual rigour with moral clarity to produce truly compelling work. A writer of great courage who evokes those written out of the grand narratives.”Fergal Keane, former BBC News Foreign Correspondent and Author“Linda Connolly has done so, so much keeping forgotten women somehow alive and so relevant in our lives. The voice of survivors must be placed at the centre of sexual violence research. It is also important that history is cemented in truth and it is fitting that this book is giving a voice to women who have been forgotten.”Lavinia Kerwick, Advocate and Survivor"This important and profound book systematically documents widespread and often unknown sexual violence in Ireland during a series of military conflicts in 1919–1923. By locating Irish gendered violence within multi-disciplinay and global scholarship, Connolly thoroughly demolishes any sense of 'Irish exceptionalism' that allowed earlier historians to argue that Ireland had somehow escaped this most troubling aspect of warfare."Dr. John Borgonovo, Professor of History, University College Cork

• 1. Gender, War and Violence in Ireland’s Revolution: Context, Concepts, Denial and Reopening the Past, 2. Violence and Trauma in the Archive: A Review of Ethical-Methodological Questions, 3. Hair: “Scissor Outrages”, 4. Imperial Violence and the War of Independence: “Taken out and ill-treated”, 5. Loyalist Women: “Unspeakable Indignity and Humiliation”, 6. The Irish Civil War: “Brother Against Sister”, 7. Women in Ulster and on the Border 1919-98: “Revolting Treatment”, 8. After the Revolution: Trauma, Mental Health and Hidden Injuries, 9. Conclusion: A Tapestry of Violence