Trad Nation: Gender, Sexuality, and Race in Irish Traditional Music

Description

Just how "Irish" is traditional Irish music? Trad Nation combines ethnography, oral history, and archival research to challenge the longstanding practice of using ethnic nationalism as a framework for understanding vernacular music traditions. Tes Slominski argues that ethnic nationalism hinders this music's development today in an increasingly multiethnic Ireland and in the transnational Irish traditional music scene. She discusses early 21st century women whose musical lives were shaped by Ireland's struggles to become a nation; follows the career of Julia Clifford, a fiddler who lived much of her life in England, and explores the experiences of women, LGBTQ+ musicians, and musicians of color in the early 21st century. Cover Trad Nation Title Copyright Dedication CONTENTS Acknowledgments Introduction ONE Mother Ireland and the Queen of Irish Fiddlers: Women Musicians and the Nation in Early Twentieth-Century Ireland TWO The Not-So-Strange Disappearance of Treasa Ní Ailpín (Teresa Halpin): Class, Gender, and Musical Style in Early Twentieth-Century Ireland THREE Biography, Musical Life, and Gender: Julia Clifford as a Woman Traditional Musician FOUR Subjectivity, Flow, and “the Music Itself” FIVE Playing Right and the Right to Play: (Dis)identification Tactics Among Queer Musicians and Musicians of Color Notes Bibliography Index ABOUT THE AUTHOR