Abstract
One of the core socio-political and cultural aspects of unionist discourse in Northern Ireland is the need to foster and protect a sense of legitimate grievance in respect of the killings and injuries of innocent Protestant civilians by the Provisional Irish Republican Army during the conflict of 1969–1998. This paper uses illustrative examples to analyse the ways in which unionists narrate, remember, and attempt to politicise suffering in contemporary post-conflict Northern Ireland. Based on extensive and original ethnographic research, it illuminates the ways in which many unionists feel that the stories of those in their community who were assassinated or attacked by Irish republican paramilitaries have remained untold, silenced by their political opponents, and ignored by both their fellow British citizens and successive British administrations. Unless the issue of unionist victimhood is handled sensitively, this will present a significant impediment to the prospects for effectively dealing with the past in Northern Ireland.
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.
Similar content being viewed by others
References
Amstutz, M. (2004) The Healing of Nations: The Promise and Limits of Political Forgiveness, London: Rowman and Littlefield.
Anderson, J. and Shuttleworth, I. (1998) ‘Sectarian demography, territoriality and political development in Northern Ireland’, Political Geography 17 (2): 187–208.
Antze, P. and Lambek, M. (eds.) (1996) Tense Past: Cultural Essays in Trauma and Memory, London: Routledge.
Augé, M. (1995) Non-places: Introduction to an Anthropology of Supermodernity, London: Verso.
Bell, C. (2003) ‘Dealing with the past in Northern Ireland’, Fordham International Law Journal 26 (4): 1095–1148.
Biggar, N. (ed.) (2001) Burying the Past: Making Peace and Doing Justice after Civil Conflict, Washington, DC: Georgetown University Press.
Booth, W.J. (2001) ‘The unforgotten: memories of justice’, American Political Science Review 95: 777–791.
Borradori, G (2004) Philosophy in a Time of Terror: Dialogues with Jurgen Habermas and Jacques Derrida, Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
Boym, S. (2001) The Future of Nostalgia, New York: Basic Books.
Bruce, S. (1994) The Edge of the Union: The Ulster Loyalist Political Vision, Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Bruce, S. (2001) ‘Terrorists and politics: the case of Northern Ireland's loyalist paramilitaries’, Terrorism and Political Violence 13: 27–48.
Bruce, S. (2007) Paisley: Religion and Politics in Northern Ireland, Oxford: Oxford University Press.
CAIN Web Service (Conflict Archive on the Internet), University of Ulster (2008). Available online at 〈 http://cain.ulst.ac.uk 〉.
Caruth, C. (1995) Trauma: Explorations in Memory, Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press.
Caruth, C. (1996) Unclaimed Experience: Trauma, Narrative and History, Baltimore: John Hopkins University Press.
Das, V., Kleiman, A., Lock, M., Ramphele, M. and Reynolds, P. (eds.) (2001) Remaking a World: Violence, Social Suffering, and Recovery, Berkeley: University of California Press.
Dawson, G. (2003) ‘Mobilising Memories: Protestant and Unionist Victims’ Groups and the Politics of Victimhood in the Irish Peace Process’, in P. Gready (ed.) Political Transition: Politics and Cultures, London: Pluto Press.
Dingley, J. (1998) ‘A reply to White's non sectarian thesis of PIRA targeting’, Terrorism and Political Violence 10 (2): 106–117.
Donnan, H. (2005) ‘Material identities: fixing ethnicity in the Irish borderlands’, Identities: Global Studies in Culture and Power 12 (1): 69–105.
Donnan, H. and Simpson, K. (2007) ‘Silence and violence among Northern Ireland border protestants’, Ethnos 72 (1): 5–28.
Dudley-Edwards, R. (1999) The Faithful Tribe, London: Harper Collins.
Edkins, J. (2003) Trauma and the Memory of Politics, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
English, R. (2003) Armed Struggle: A History of the IRA, London: Macmillan.
Felman, S. and Laub, D. (1992) Testimony: Crises of Witnessing in Literature, Psychoanalysis and History, London and New York: Routledge.
Great Britain Parliament. (1998) Northern Ireland Act, London: HMSO.
Habermas, J. (1984) The Theory of Communicative Action (English) — Vol. 1: Reason and the Rationalization of Society, London: Heinemann.
Habermas, J. (1996) Between Facts and Norms: Contributions to a Discourse Theory of Law and Democracy, Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.
Habermas, J. (2006) The Divided West, London: Polity.
Hastrup, K. (2003) ‘Violence, suffering and human rights: anthropological reflections’, Anthropological Theory 3: 309–323.
Humphrey, M. (2002) The Politics of Atrocity and Reconciliation: From Terror to Trauma, London: Routledge.
Humphrey, M. (2005) ‘Reconciliation and the therapeutic state’, Journal of Intercultural Studies 26 (3): 203–220.
Huyssen, A. (1995) Twilight Memories: Marking Time in a Culture of Amnesia, New York: Routledge.
Jackson, M. (2002) The Politics of Storytelling: Violence, Transgression and Intersubjectivity, Copenhagen: Museum Tusculanum Press.
Kristeva, J. (1982) Powers of Horror: An Essay in Abjection, New York: Columbia University Press.
Parkinson, A. (1998) Ulster Loyalism and the British Media, Dublin: Four Courts Press.
Parkinson, A. (2001) ‘Bigots in Bowler Hats? The Presentation and Reception of the Loyalist Case in Great Britain’, in D.B. George and A. O’Day (eds.) Defenders of the Union: A Survey of British and Irish Unionism Since 1801, London: Routledge.
Patterson, H. (2006) Ireland Since 1939, Dublin: Penguin Ireland.
Phelps, T.G. (2004) Shattered Voices: Language, Violence and the Work of Truth Commissions, Pennsylvania: University of Pennsylvania Press.
Rae, H. (2002) State Identities and the Homogenisation of Peoples (Cambridge Studies in International Relations). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Ricoeur, P. (1984) Time and Narrative, Vol. 1, Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
Ricoeur, P. (2004) Memory, History, Forgetting, Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
Shirlow, P. and Murtagh, B. (2006) Belfast: Segregation, Violence and the City, London: Pluto.
Simpson, K. (2007a) ‘Voices silenced, voices rediscovered: victims of violence and the reclamation of language in transitional societies’, International Journal of Law in Context 3 (2): 89–103.
Simpson, K. (2007b) ‘Victims of political violence: a Habermasian model of truth recovery’, Journal of Human Rights 6 (3): 325–343.
Simpson, K. (2008) Truth Recovery in Northern Ireland: Critically Interpreting the Past, Manchester: Manchester University Press (forthcoming).
Simpson, K. (2009) Unionist Voices: The Politics of Remembering the Past in Northern Ireland, London: Palgrave Macmillan (forthcoming).
Torpey, J. (2001) ‘Making whole what has been smashed: reflections on reparations’, The Journal of Modern History 73: 333–358.
Torpey, J. (2003) Making Whole What Has Been Smashed: On Reparation Politics, Massachusetts: Harvard University Press.
Trouillot, M.-R. (1995) Silencing the Past: Power and the Production of History, Boston, MA: Beacon.
West, H. (2003) ‘Voices twice silenced’, Anthropological Theory 3 (3): 343–365.
Wilson, R. (2003) ‘Anthropological studies of national reconciliation processes’, Anthropological Theory 3 (3): 367–387.
Acknowledgements
This paper forms part of a much larger research monograph, entitled: ‘Unionist Voices And The Politics of Remembering the Past in Northern Ireland’ (forthcoming 2009: Palgrave). My sincere thanks go to Amy Lankester-Owen, Politics Publisher at Palgrave, for her valuable and much appreciated support. This paper is based on research that was funded by the RCUK and a British Academy Small Research Grant. Thanks to colleagues at the Transitional Justice Institute, University of Ulster, for their informal comments and suggestions related to parts of this work; to the anonymous reviewers who made such helpful suggestions; to Dr Steven Kettell, a co-editor of British Politics, for his much valued assistance; and to Professor Colm Campbell in particular for encouraging this research. Lastly, it is important to emphasise my utmost gratitude to all of those unionist civilians in Northern Ireland who gave their time so generously to speak with me, and to tell me their stories.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Simpson, K. Untold Stories: Unionist Remembrance of Political Violence and Suffering in Northern Ireland. Br Polit 3, 465–489 (2008). https://doi.org/10.1057/bp.2008.22
Published:
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1057/bp.2008.22