Ciaran Carson's Belfast: Redrafting the Destroyed Native Space

Barrios-O'Neill, Danielle (2011) Ciaran Carson's Belfast: Redrafting the Destroyed Native Space. Nordic Irish Studies, 10. pp. 15-33. ISSN 1602-124X

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Abstract / Summary

As an exploration of proto-digital modes and postnational identity in the writing of Northern Irish writer Ciaran Carson, this paper looks at the sociotechnological, coterminous evolutions of writing and identity in relation to structures of nationalism. I place emphasis on how Carson’s Belfast is part oral story (tribal and pretextual) and part metamedial (global and posttextual), and I make arguments for the "post-conflict" identity as one of complex interdependency., perhaps more so than elsewhere.

Key issues of the paper include the dynamics of home and exile, the oral community, the textual nation, digital globality, and an emergent textuality composed of integrated virtual and real, or the posttext, in Carson's work. I argue that all of these elements interact to produce the unique location of Carson's Belfast. I also analyze how, as borders and centers are deconstructed, the Carsonian text hints at a vastly channeled, hyperstructural sense of space. I contend that, insofar as the writing can be interpreted as a spatial and historical code, it has the potential to reinvent home and identity as open spaces.

Item Type:	Article
Uncontrolled Keywords:	Ciaran Carson, Irish literature, English literature, Ireland, post-conflict, conflict literature, digital humanities, post-text, post-digital
ISSN:	1602-124X
Subjects:	Communication > Media > Digital Media Writing & Journalism > Literature > English Literature Writing & Journalism > Literature Communication > Media Technology History > UK
Courses by Department:	The School of Writing & Journalism > English & Writing
Related URLs:	Author
Depositing User:	Danielle Barrios-O'Neill
Date Deposited:	19 Jun 2017 09:56
Last Modified:	11 Nov 2022 16:30
URI:	https://repository.falmouth.ac.uk/id/eprint/2319

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