Gendered Spaces in Contemporary Irish Poetry

(Grace) #1

mastery and the routinization of cultural authority.^44 Like the post-
colonial and feminist writers under discussion, the poets problematize
a tradition of cultivation that straightforwardly claims ëa sense of
placeí, with the effect of displacing ëauthoritarianí and ëauthenticí
modes of cultural expression. NÌ Dhomhnaill and OíLoughlin exem-
plify this process with their critique of the figures of Cuchulainn and
Cathleen. This results in a critical situation whereby the calling to
authenticity is neither avoided by the poets nor met without suspicion.


44 Ibid. Cf. Bourdieu on cultivation in ‘The Pleasure of the Text’, pp.498–500.

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