The Eternal Paddy: Irish Identity and the British Press, 1798-1882 (review)

A welcome extension to studies of the simian Irish in Victorian cartoons, Michael de Nie's impressive analysis of the portrayal of Paddy in the press reveals considerable ambivalence and inconsistency in British attitudes to the Irish. The database is impressive. Some ninety- odd newspapers have been consulted during four critical episodes in agonised discussion of "the Irish question": 1798 to 1800, 1845 to 1852, 1867 to 1870, and 1879 to 1882. What emerges from such episodic deconstruction is an enhanced understanding of the Irish as the "internal other" within the United Kingdom. During each crisis—from the 1798 rebellion and the Act of Union, through the Famine, Fenianism, and on to the Land War—the press oscillated between sympathy and hostility towards Ireland. On each occasion, they looked to "anglicization" to solve admitted grievances and problems across the water but then bemoaned the "Irishness" that—intentionally or not—always precluded the desired resolution. Hence the logic behind the Incumbered Estates Act that looked to the arrival of English and Scottish capitalists to induce the necessary cultural change among the Irish peasantry. Finally, in an admission of defeat and despair, as it were, the British abandoned all hope of anglicization and began to contemplate home rule for Ireland, at which tantalising point de Nie concludes this volume with the promise of a sequel.

Each episode in this prehistory of home rule contributed to the articulation and confirmation of ethnic attitudes, the specific contextual factors serving to reinforce traditional stereotypes and discriminatory views through what de Nie labels the "Paddy trinity" of race, religion, and class. Having shown the increasing appeal of the pseudoscience of race in Victorian Britain, de Nie's analysis is weighted heavily towards the first factor of this constellation. As applied to the Irish, however, the language of race needs to be handled with critical caution, hence indeed the inconsistency and ambivalence displayed by the press. While sophisticated and nuanced in his analysis, de Nie accords insignificant acknowledgement to the comparatively elevated position of the white and European "colonised" Irish. As members of the United Kingdom with direct representation at Westminster, the Irish were at least attributed with the potential to anglicize, a desideratum that the British denied to indigenous people out in the Empire. Miscegenation was acceptable to integrate the Irish into the United Kingdom, while in the overseas Empire it was inadmissible (a proscription that was distinctively British, carrying far less force in the overseas colonies of other European nations). For the British, the seemingly irresolvable Irish question was not one of fundamental racial division, but of ethnic difference. While not always fully up to standard, the "whiteness" of the Irish was not in question: the problem was their Paddy "greenness."

The racial terminology apart, there are a number of methodological issues that give cause for concern in an otherwise exemplary study that is always generous in reference to the work of others in the field. As noted above, the knowledge base is impressive, but we are given insufficient explanation of the criteria by which newspapers were selected and of the systematic manner in which they were studied. Much remains inadequately explained or unexamined about the seemingly rather random collection of newspapers. At the very least, we need to know far more about the "ethnic" composition of their journalistic staff, a profession heavily populated by the Irish in Britain; about the size and nature of their readership; and about the extent of their impact and influence. While there is much to commend in cultural history, its practitioners need to consider the representativeness and resonance of their chosen texts. They should also acknowledge the gap—or indeed dislocation—between published attitudes, however popular or populist, and public policy. Offensive as it was, pejorative ethnic stereotyping (always strengthened at times of political crisis or violence) should not be equated with racial subordination or discrimination in law. A number of recent studies have...