Irish Nationalists in America (original) (raw)

's Irish Nationalists in America employs no sleight of hand in its title. It is a short, wellcrafted new survey of Irish nationalists in the United States from the late 18th century to the close of the 20th that is more than the sum of its parts. What Brundage attempts-and achieves-is a focused study of nationalism, and not just in its political expression and diplomatic implications, but in its social and cultural forms through two-and-a-bit centuries of US national life. He rightly argues that 'Irish nationalism was … an almost textbook example of a transnational phenomenon, ... involving the movement of people and the exchange of ideas, information, money, and … arms' (p. 6). In addition, he makes three claims. First, that 'the Irish in America had an enormous impact on the course of nationalism back in Ireland' (p. 2). Second, that 'Irish nationalists also exerted considerable influence on political and social developments in the United States' (p. 3). And finally, deploying Lord Acton's aphorism that 'exile is the nursery of nationalism', Brundage argues that 'long-distance' or 'diasporic' nationalism 'is as old as nationalism itself' (pp. 3-4).(1) If anything, this interpretive triptych undersells Brundage's distinctive contribution: by adopting a long historical perspective he is able to highlight the 'repeated rejuvenat[ion]' of Irish nationalism (p. 6), and it is this emphasis on generational change and transmission that distinguishes Brundage's argument from its historiographical antecedents.