Constructions of the Irish Child in the Independence Period, 1910-1940 [Hardcover]

This volume explores how Irish children were constructed by various actors including the state, youth organisations, authors and publishers in the period before and after Ireland gained independence in 1922. It examines the broad variety of ways in which the Irish child was constructed through social and cultural activities like education, sport, youth organizations, and cultural production such as literature, toys, and clothes, covering themes ranging from gender, religion and social class, to the broader politics of identity, citizenship, and nation-building. A variety of ideals and ideologies, some of them conflicting, competed to inform how children were constructed by the adults who looked on them as embodying the future of the nation. Contributors ask fundamental questions about how children were constructed as part of the idealisation of the state before its formation, and the consolidation of the state after its foundation. Foreword; Professor Pat Dolan.- Chapter 1. Introduction; Ciara Boylan & Ciara Gallagher.- Section I Education and Learning.- Chapter 2. Concepts of Children and Childhood from an Educational Perspective: Context, Curriculum and Experience; Thomas Walsh.- Chapter 3. The Church of Irelands Response to Changes in the National School Curriculum in Post-independence Ireland 1922-40; Martina Relihan.- Chapter 4. A Treasure-house for the Young: Free Public Libraries and The Irish Child; M?ire Kennedy.- Section II Literature and Language.- Chapter 5. Drama for Children in the Irish Free State: Sin?ad De Valeras Plays for Schoolchildren; Kate Harvey.- Chapter 6. Jim?n Mh?ire Thaidhg and Constructions of Childhood in Irish-language Childrens Literature in the Independence Period, 1910-40; R?is?n Adams.- Chapter 7. For children or nuns: Language and Ideology in Irish-language Tral�