Childhood in the spotlight for weekend conference

Children and Childhood before and after the Revolution in Ireland, a two-day conference taking place this Friday and Saturday, September 16 and 17, will examine the history of children and childhood during the Easter Rising, the War of Independence and in post-independence Ireland.

The conference will kick off this evening, Friday, at 5.30pm with an event in Galway City Museum. Galway Childhoods is being held in association with Culture Night and co-organised with historian Dr John Cunningham of NUI Galway. It will consist of12 short, illustrated talks, each eight minutes long.

On Saturday, the conference will start at 9am in the Institute for Lifecourse and Society, NUIG, on Upper Newcastle Road.

The keynote speaker is RTÉ’s Joe Duffy at 2pm, whose book Children of the Rising, The Untold Story of the Young Lives Lost During Easter 1916, gives names, details of deaths and family backgrounds, when possible, for the 40 children killed during the Rising.

He is just one of a fine line-up of speakers who will be examining topics such as na Fianna Éirean, Youth and the Irish Revolution, the Industrial School system, Childhood in the 1950s and contemporary Ireland, including life for young people who are in Direct Provision.

This conference is a free, public event sponsored by NUI Galway and all are welcome for all or any part of the two days. For further details or to register, email Dr Sarah-Anne Buckley, sarahanne.buckley@gmail.com.

Full programme details can be found on http://www.nuigalway.ie/sep2016/ and on Facebook.