Saturday 18th January 2014, Institute of Irish Studies, University of Liverpool

The Women on Ireland Research Network invite paper proposals for a symposium on Irish Women, Religion and the Diaspora. This Symposium seeks to understand not only the shifting role that religion has played in the lives of Irish women but the role that Irish women themselves have undertaken in religious institutions and organisations and how this role has changed over time. Although the idea of diaspora assumes a shared experience, Irish migrants were of different social, economic, political and even religious backgrounds. Their experiences were coloured by their end destinations which included the United Kingdom, North America, Australia and New Zealand, Argentina, Mexico, South Africa, Brazil, Chile, Jamaica, Bermuda, Puerto Rico, India and continental Europe. This symposium aims to tease out the significance of religion to Irish women at home and abroad.

Within this framework of Irish women, Religion and Diaspora, topics could include, but are not limited to:

· Religious and social networks and the significance of place · Religion and cultural transfer
· Material culture and Irishness
· Experiences of religion expressed through literature
· Irish women’s religious institutes and diaspora
· Irish lay women and faith-based organisations
· Irish women and global religious dynamics
· Diaspora, place and missions
· National and transnational religious networks

Each paper should be no longer than 20 minutes and 300 word proposals should be send to both Dr Maria Power (m.c.power@liv.ac.uk) and Dr Carmen Mangion (c.mangion@bbk.ac.uk) by 30th June 2013.