Irish Studies at the University of Missouri-St. Louis and Smurfit-Stone Endowed Professorship in Irish Studies
Irish Studies Events
2007-2008 Academic Year
Summer Program
Galway, Ireland - 2008
Smurfit-Stone Endowed Professors in Irish Studies
Dr. Gearóid Ó hAllmhuráin
Professor of Music
314-516-4256
314-516-6757 FAX
Gearóid Ó hAllmhuráin
A fourth generation traditional musician and a native of Co. Clare on the west coast of Ireland, Gearóid Ó hAllmhuráin is the Smurfit-Stone Endowed Professor of Irish Studies and Professor of Music at the University of Missouri-St Louis. A graduate of University College Cork, Trinity College Dublin and Université de Toulon, France, he received his doctoral degree from Queen’s University Belfast. Author of A Pocket History of Irish Traditional Music (O’Brien Press, 1998), and numerous monographs on Irish traditional music and folk culture, his work has been featured on PBS, CBC Québec, TFN France, RTE, BBC and NPR. He holds five All-Ireland Championship music titles: as a concertina player, uilleann piper, and as a member of the Kilfenora Céilí Band, the oldest traditional dance band in Ireland. As a professional musician, he has presented over one thousand concerts on four continents during the past thirty years. His CD recordings include Traditional Music from Clare and Beyond (1996), Tracin' -Traditional Music from the West of Ireland (1999) and The Independence Suite - Traditional Music from Ireland, Scotland and Cape Breton (2004), published on the Celtic Crossings label. A consultant for documentaries on Irish traditional music in Europe and North America, he is a US correspondent for RTE’s Raidió na Gaeltachta.
Dr. Eamonn Wall
Professor of English
314-516-5589
314-516-6757 FAX
Eamonn Wall
?A native of Co. Wexford, Éamonn Wall is the Smurfit-Stone Endowed Professor of Irish Studies and Professor of English at the University of Missouri-St Louis. Éamonn Wall received his degrees from University College, Dublin, the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, and the City University of New York Graduate Center. He is the author of From the Sin-é Café to the Black Hills: Notes on the New Irish (University of Wisconsin Press, 2000) which received the Michael J. Durkan Prize from the American Conference for Irish Studies for excellence in scholarship, and four collections of poetry by Salmon Publishing, Ireland, including Iron Mountain Road (1997), The Crosses (2000) and Refuge at DeSoto Bend (2004). He has published articles, essays, and reviews in such publications as New Hibernia Review, Triquarterly, Washington Post Book World, Chicago Tribune, Review of Contemporary Fiction, The Recorder, and An Sionnach. He was the guest editor of Natural Bridge: A Journal of Contemporary Literature published by the University of Missouri-St. Louis in 2002. Éamonn Wall is past president of The American Conference of Irish Studies. He has lived in the US since 1982.
A UNIQUE GIFT IN SUPPORT OF INTERNATIONAL EDUCATION
In 1996, Dr. Michael Smurfit pledged the funds to create the Smurfit-Stone Endowed Professorship in Irish Studies. As a major multinational corporation with more than 50,000 employees in 25 countries, Smurfit-Stone clearly exemplifies what it means to be a good corporate citizen in the era of global economic interdependence. Integral to the efforts to internationalize the University of Missouri-St. Louis, this professorship represents another important step in ensuring that our students and the local community understand and communicate with people of different cultures.
AN INTERDISCIPLINARY APPROACH
Two professors, Gearóid Ó hAllmhuráin and Eamonn Wall, provide leadership in the development of Irish Studies on our campus. These professors take an interdisciplinary approach to promote teaching, research and community service in the Irish arts, humanities or history. Working with the Center, the Irish-American community and the community at large, the professors develop programs for campus and community audiences about Ireland and the Irish expatriate experience. The professors also collaborate with the other international professors and the Center to develop a comprehensive international program highlighting the diversity of St. Louis' ethnic heritage.
PROGRAMS FOR CAMPUS AND COMMUNITY
The establishment of the Smurfit-Stone Distinguished Lecturer series has permitted the Center for International Studies to offer outstanding programs for campus and community audiences. Among them were the week-long visits of Dr. Nicholas Canny, a noted Irish historian from the National University of Ireland, who spoke on the colonization of Ireland, Dr. Gearóid O'hAllmhuráin, a distinguished Irish musicologist, and one of the Irish Studies chairs, provided both an educational and entertaining overview of traditional Irish music and culture, and Dr. Gearóid O'Tuathaith who presented lectures placing important events in Twentieth century Irish history into historical perspective. In addition, the professorship sponsored the visit of the Honorable John Hume, Nobel Peace Prize laureate who spoke about the peace process in Northern Ireland.
