On the Borders of Contention: Brexit's physical and psychological impact on Britain's border with Ireland

Breen, P. 2022. On the Borders of Contention: Brexit's physical and psychological impact on Britain's border with Ireland . in: Loussouarn , S. (ed.) Brexit and Its Aftermath UK Bloomsbury Academic.

Chapter titleOn the Borders of Contention: Brexit's physical and psychological impact on Britain's border with Ireland
AuthorsBreen, P.
EditorsLoussouarn , S.
Abstract

There is a “unique political gravity” to Brexit’s impact on Ireland (Gormley-Heenan and Aughey, 2017, p.1). O’Brennan (2019, p. 168) cites Tánaiste Simon Coveney as stating that since the signing of the Good Friday Agreement of 1998, peace has “transformed the landscape and allowed identity to breathe more freely.” This has been put at great risk because of Britain’s decision to leave the EU and close its “front door to the European continent” whilst paying scant attention to the fact that “the UK’s back door to Ireland is wide open” (McCall, 2018, p. 10). New relationships had developed out of the Good Friday Agreement’s “grand experiment in transnational governance” (O’Brennan, 2019, p. 160) allowing soft spaces and functional geographies (Walsh, 2019) to emerge from conflict zones once deemed both physically and politically impassable. The risk then is a return to hard borders and a subsequent hardening of identity politics. The goal of this chapter and the study herein has been to research the perceptions of people for whom the closing of borders is not a secondary consideration. Through surveys and interviews, I have gathered and synthesised the voices of research participants from a diverse range of backgrounds on both sides of the border in Ireland. Regardless of each personal stance, a common thread emerges from this tapestry of voices – a recognition of all being “changed, changed utterly” (Yeats, 1921). Bringing together a wide range of voices this chapter looks at what such changes might mean for people, both physically and psychologically.

KeywordsBrexit
Good Friday Agreement
European Union
Northern Ireland
Irish border
functional geographies
Book titleBrexit and Its Aftermath
Year2022
PublisherBloomsbury Academic
Publication dates
Published16 Jun 2022
Place of publicationUK
ISBN9780755640799
0755640799

Related outputs

Advancing Conversations About EDI in Football
Breen, P. 2021. Advancing Conversations About EDI in Football. Advancing conversations about EDI in football. University of Westminster 25 - 25 Jun 2021

EAP Student Perspectives on Using Real Work Activities Within Their Courses
Breen, P. 2021. EAP Student Perspectives on Using Real Work Activities Within Their Courses . BALEAP Conference 2019. University of Leeds 12 - 14 Apr 2019

Implementing the TRAAC model in an Academic English Context
Breen, P. 2021. Implementing the TRAAC model in an Academic English Context. in: Tran, D. (ed.) Decolonizing University Teaching and Learning: An Entry Model for Grappling with Complexities UK Bloomsbury.

Two sides still at play 20 years after the Good Friday Agreement
Breen, P. and Huddleston, S. 2021. Two sides still at play 20 years after the Good Friday Agreement. in: Carr, J., Parnell, D., Widdop, P., Power, M.J. and Millar, S.R. (ed.) Football, Politics and Identity UK Routledge.

Situating observations as part of a teaching portfolio.
Breen, P. 2020. Situating observations as part of a teaching portfolio. Compass: The Journal of Learning and Teaching at the University of Greenwich. 13 (1). https://doi.org/10.21100/compass.v13i1.968

Reproduced, reinterpreted, lost: Trajectories of scientific knowledge across contexts
Gimenez, J., Baldwin, M., Breen, P., Green, J., Roque Gutierrez, E., Paterson, R., Pearson, J., Percy, M., Specht, D. and Waddell, G. 2020. Reproduced, reinterpreted, lost: Trajectories of scientific knowledge across contexts. Text & Talk. 40 (3), pp. 293-324. https://doi.org/10.1515/text-2020-2059

Towards a periodic table of EAP teacher knowledge
Breen, P. 2019. Towards a periodic table of EAP teacher knowledge. BALEAP.

Bursting the bubble and bringing the real world into our classrooms to increase student engagement
Breen, P. 2019. Bursting the bubble and bringing the real world into our classrooms to increase student engagement. InForm International Foundation Journal. 19, pp. 20-22.

Book review of The 1916 Irish Rebellion by Bríona Nic Dhiarmada with foreword by Mary McAleese
Breen, P. 2019. Book review of The 1916 Irish Rebellion by Bríona Nic Dhiarmada with foreword by Mary McAleese . National Identities. 21 (1), pp. 116-117. https://doi.org/10.1080/14608944.2017.1369680

Healing past wounds with more than an elastic bandage– A small scale evaluation of attitudes and aspirations of contemporary Northern Irish Catholics
Breen, P. 2019. Healing past wounds with more than an elastic bandage– A small scale evaluation of attitudes and aspirations of contemporary Northern Irish Catholics. National Identities. 21 (2), pp. 151-169. https://doi.org/10.1080/14608944.2017.1397618

Developing Educators for The Digital Age: A Framework for Capturing Knowledge in Action
Breen, P. 2018. Developing Educators for The Digital Age: A Framework for Capturing Knowledge in Action. University of Westminster, London University of Westminster Press.

Developing Educators in the Digital Age: A Framework for Capturing Knowledge in Action
Breen, P. 2018. Developing Educators in the Digital Age: A Framework for Capturing Knowledge in Action . London University of Westminster Press.

The Footballing Elephant in the Room? The Irish National Football Teams and Northern Players who declare for the Republic of Ireland
Breen, P. 2017. The Footballing Elephant in the Room? The Irish National Football Teams and Northern Players who declare for the Republic of Ireland. 2017 Annual Conference of The Football Collective. University of Limerick 23 - 24 Nov 2017

Native or Novice?: An Exploratory Study of the Access to and Use of Digital Technologies among Pathway Students
Velliaris, D.M. and Breen, P. 2016. Native or Novice?: An Exploratory Study of the Access to and Use of Digital Technologies among Pathway Students. in: Pinheiro, M.M. and Simões, D. (ed.) Handbook of Research on Engaging Digital Natives in Higher Education Settings Hershey, USA IGI Global. pp. 1-20

Tailoring graduate attributes to meet the needs of international students in a pathway program
Velliaris, D.M. and Breen, P. 2016. Tailoring graduate attributes to meet the needs of international students in a pathway program. Journal of International Students. 6 (2), pp. 565-587 12.

Letting Go and Letting the Angels Grow: Using Etienne Wenger's Community of Practice Theory to Facilitate Teacher Education
Breen, P. 2015. Letting Go and Letting the Angels Grow: Using Etienne Wenger's Community of Practice Theory to Facilitate Teacher Education. International Journal of Web-Based Learning and Teaching Technologies . 10 (1), pp. 14-26 2. https://doi.org/10.4018/ijwltt.2015010102

Reflections on the impact of social technologies on lecturers in a pathway institution
Velliaris, D.M., Willis, C.R. and Breen, P. 2015. Reflections on the impact of social technologies on lecturers in a pathway institution. in: Benson, V. and Morgan, S. (ed.) Implications of Social Media Use in Personal and Professional Settings Hershey, PA, United States IGI Global. pp. 131-154

Realizing the power of social media in the 21st century
Breen, P. 2015. Realizing the power of social media in the 21st century. Pennsylvania (USA) IGI Global.

Academic reflections: disciplinary acculturation and the first-year pathway experience in Australia
Breen, P., Velliaris, D. and Willis, C. 2015. Academic reflections: disciplinary acculturation and the first-year pathway experience in Australia. in: Shrestha, P.N. (ed.) Current developments in English for academic and specific purposes: local innovations and global perspectives Reading, Berkshire Garnet Education.

An Intramuscular Approach to Teacher Development in International Collaborative Higher Education
Breen, P. 2014. An Intramuscular Approach to Teacher Development in International Collaborative Higher Education. in: Mukerji, S. and Tripathi, P. (ed.) Handbook of Research on Transnational Higher Education Hershey, PA IGI Global. pp. 368-390

Symbols, Language, and Identity in Northern Ireland
Breen, P. 2014. Symbols, Language, and Identity in Northern Ireland. ESSE - English Studies in Albania. 5 (1), pp. 9-22 1.

Introducing TPACK in a Widening Participation Context
Breen, P. and Khan, S. 2014. Introducing TPACK in a Widening Participation Context. Paulo Freire and Transformative Education: Changing Lives and Transforming Communities Conference. University of Central Lancashire (UCLan) School of Education & Social Science and The Freire Institute, Preston, Lancashire 28 Apr 2014

Philosophies, traditional pedagogy, and new technologies: a report on a case study of EAP teachers' integration of technology into traditional practice
Breen, P. 2014. Philosophies, traditional pedagogy, and new technologies: a report on a case study of EAP teachers' integration of technology into traditional practice. in: Breen, P. (ed.) Cases on teacher identity, diversity, and cognition in higher education Pennsylvania (USA) IGI Global. pp. 317-341

An unending affair: culture, language & identity in Northern Ireland
Breen, P. 2013. An unending affair: culture, language & identity in Northern Ireland. Albanian Society of English International Conference on British and American Studies. Canadian Institute of Technology, Tirana, Albania 03 May 2013

Teachers in a tide of change: technology’s influence on professional practice
Breen, P. 2013. Teachers in a tide of change: technology’s influence on professional practice. Identity explored: Language centre, language professional, language teacher, language learner (26th Communication Skills Workshop). University of Helsinki, Helsinki, Finland 14 Sep 2013

Navigating a pathway to partnership through turbulent seas of adversity
Breen, P., Stefani, M. and Kostoulas, A. 2011. Navigating a pathway to partnership through turbulent seas of adversity. in: Tripathi, P. and Mukerji, S. (ed.) Cases on innovations in educational marketing: transnational and technological strategies Hershey, Pennsylvania, USA IGI Global.

Permalink - https://westminsterresearch.westminster.ac.uk/item/v6326/on-the-borders-of-contention-brexit-s-physical-and-psychological-impact-on-britain-s-border-with-ireland


Share this

Usage statistics

438 total views
0 total downloads
These values cover views and downloads from WestminsterResearch and are for the period from September 2nd 2018, when this repository was created.