Reinventing Modern Dublin: Streetscape, Iconography and the Politics of Identity: Streetscape, Iconography and the Politics of Identity

Takes the reader from the contested iconography of Dublin as it evolved in the early part of the 20th century before Independence through to the contemporary plans for the millennium spire on O'Connell Street. Yvonne Whelan, Lecturer at the Academy for Irish Cultural Heritages, University of Ulster, shows how a shift has taken place from an intensely political symbolic landscape to one that is increasingly apolitical, in tune with the changing nature of Irish politics, culture, and society at the turn of the century. In her comprehensive discussion of how the streetscape has changed, she explores the capacity of the cultural landscape to underpin and reinforce particular narratives of identity and reveals the ways in which issues of street naming, building, designing, and memorializing became firmly grounded in space and bound up with the politics of representation. This highly readable work of historical, cultural, and urban geography provides important information about Dublin's historical geography and its Irish urbanism.