This episode is the second of a three-part series produced by Eleanor Neil, contributing editor at American Anthropologist and Anthropological Airwaves. From the African American Burial Ground in New York City to the memorialization of violence in Northern Ireland to professional archaeology in the eastern Mediterranean, Eleanor asks archaeologists with different regional and methodological specialties to choose a single object or site, and, in their own words describe how this this site or artefact speaks to the interaction between archaeology and political or social identity across time and place. In this episode, Dr. Laura McAtackney, discusses the materiality of violence and partition, the nature of commemoration and how archaeology of the recent past has an integral role in our understandings of politics, society and conflict. Dr. McAtackney is an associate professor at Aarhus University and her research centres on the historical and contemporary archaeologies of institutions and colonialism in Ireland. 

Episode Transcript

Closed-Captioning

Further Reading: 

Flanagan, Eimear. “McGurk’s Bar Bombing: I just want justice for my grandparents.” BBC News: Northern Ireland, 12 December 2021. 

McAtackney, Laura. “Materials and Memory: Archaeology and Heritage as Tools of Transitional Justice at a Former Magdalen Laundry.” Éire-Ireland 55, nos. 1 & 2, (Spring/Summer 2020): 223-246. 

MacAirt, Ciarán. "Corporate memory and the McGurk's Bar Massacre: CQ&A automatically added to new episodes on Spotifiarán MacAirt writes about the murder of his grandmother and 14 other civilians in a Belfast bar 43 years ago, and the families’ on-going campaign for truth." Criminal Justice Matters 98, no. 1 (2014): 6-7. 

Justice for Magdalenes Research - an online resource associated with the NGO, Justice for Magdalenes. 

Credits: 

Writing, Production & Editing: Eleanor Neil 

Production Support: Anar Parikh 

Executive Producer - Anar Parikh

Thumbnail Image: Photo by Freya McClements for the Irish Times 

Featured Music: “Westlin’ Winds” by Eoin O’Donnell 

Intro/Outro: "Waiting" by Crowander