Whoop it up for Liberty!

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The Human Rights in Ireland blog will host a performance in Druid Theatre, Galway on 10th December, 2011 to celebrate World Human Rights Day. The blog was founded by Mairead Enright (University of Kent) and Fiona de Londras (University College Dublin) in 2009 and is a group academic blog with a focus on human rights issues. The regular contributors to the blog are academics, mostly lawyers, working in Ireland and abroad on issues related to human rights theory and practice as well as law and politics more broadly.

The event on 10th December is called Whoop it up for Liberty! (an ironic quote from Connolly) and will feature readings of texts which celebrate and commemorate Irish experiences of human rights, and indeed, violations of rights. Three regular contributors to the blog: Deirdre Duffy (University of Nottingham), Charles O’ Mahony and Eilionóir Flynn (both at the Centre for Disability Law and Policy, NUI Galway) are organising the event, in collaboration with Thomas Conway, literary manager at Druid Theatre, who will direct the performance.

The concept for the performance is loosely based on The People Speak – a documentary made by high profile actors reading excerpts from Howard Zinn’s The People’s History of the United States. Whoop it up for Liberty! will be an exciting collaboration between actors, community activists, local people and the authors of the Human Rights in Ireland blog. The performance will feature first person narratives which highlight the experiences of workers, women, people with disabilities, travellers, language rights activists, asylum seekers, children, prisoners and many others as they relate to human rights in Ireland – from historical perspectives right through to the present day.

Since this is a not-for-profit event, we are seeking support to cover our production costs. The director and actors involved are generously volunteering their time, and in order to do justice to the inspiring texts used to create the script, we would like to make this as professional an event as possible. Donations received will go towards the cost of hiring the venue and rehearsal space, lighting and sound, recording the performance, providing catering for the cast and crew after the performance, producing programme notes for the event, and making the performance accessible to all.

This will be the first time an event of this kind has been performed in Ireland, using first-person narratives to explore historical and present-day experiences of human rights across a broad range of issues: identity, belonging, democracy, politics, solidarity, and exclusion. We hope that people will contribute what they can to make the event a success – and we hope to see as many of you as possible on 10th December in Galway!

 

Thanks so much for your support.

Human Rights in Ireland Blog Team