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I'm so happy to do the job that I do. Today more than ever. I, along with my MSPC team - all awesome archivists - am infinitely privileged to be where I am. In the Archive. Ireland, you have a huge opportunity facing you right now....you're incredibly lucky.
All the stars are aligned for you: @PresidentIRL is a scholar and is totally engaged with history with his heart and intellect,showing a truly sound vision of what the nation could become on the other side of the commemorations, truly aware of the impact of history on the present.
You have second to none historians, hell bent on providing context, with (for most of them) incredible analytical and investigative visions. You also have professional educators and teachers who are engaged in transmitting knowledge and who know how to use primary sources.
You have professional archivists, engaged in time consuming but necessary work of cataloguing new material. The archivists I'm friends with, have an unshakable sense of duty and mission towards archive users and a deep understanding of their own impact on the nature of archives.
You have everything. Don't let this opportunity pass by you and the whole nation. Don't let lazy viewpoints and misleading political positionings skew and ruin the absolutely excellent work being produced right now. Read it. Engage with it.
It will never be perfect but you have close to ideal circumstances to face difficult events and remember intelligently, with humanity. Take it. Many nations do not have this luxury. It won't come round again. That's how nations grow.
I'm still French on paper but I am an Irish archivist. I'm more familiar with Irish history than I am with 'my own' and I see all the difficulties that a colonising country meets when it tries to come to terms with its own history. It's incredibly difficult. It's difficult
whether you are the aggressor and it's difficult when you are the oppressed. Responsibility vs forgiveness. In order to not glorify violence, you have to look at the Other. There's no other way.
If you miss that train, you'll have only yourself to blame. Make the effort. Stop the 'only in Ireland are we embarrassed by our history'. No. Every nation has something to come to terms with. Not just Ireland. We're no exception.
