North of Ireland Program coming to the USA

[Seabird]

Few regions of the world have contributed more to the formation of the United States than Northern Ireland. Since the seventeenth century, a succession of immigrants has had a profound impact on the development of American culture, politics, education, science, religion, agriculture, and industry. Proud of its past and increasingly confident of its future, Northern Ireland has only recently begun to attract the international attention it deserves.

The Northern Ireland program will bring to Washington the region's finest performers, artists, storytellers, craftspeople, cooks, and workers to help explain, demonstrate, and celebrate their culture. Through dynamic Festival performances, demonstrations, and educational activities, the program will highlight the rich history, living traditions, and distinctive customs of this beautiful region. Reflecting the complexity and creativity of Northern Ireland, the site will feature traditional industries, such as Belleek pottery and Bushmills Irish Whiskey, home-based crafts, such as lace- and bagpipe-making, and modern community expressions, such as mural painting.



This program is produced in partnership with the Department of Culture, Arts and Leisure of Northern Ireland and with the cooperation of the Arts Council of Northern Ireland.

[Seabird]

As an active member of the Irish-American community, U.S. citizen and tax payer I must express my deep concern that the Smithsonian Folklife Festival is unwittingly providing a partisan platform to a sectarian religious organization the Grand Orange Lodge which has an agenda of dividing the people of Northern Ireland.


The Smithsonian may be unaware that the Grand Orange Lodge is a sectarian, fundamentalist religious fraternity which is stridently anti-Catholic. To this day, the Grand Orange Lodge continues to sponsor events such as noisy antagonistic parades, many of which are forced through neighborhoods which do not want them, and which are highly offensive to a large part of the population, Protestant as well as Catholic. Ominously, its appearance at the Folklife Festival in late June, 2007 will coincide with the beginning of the Orange Lodges divisive summer marching season, an affront to decent people everywhere. The Orange Lodge is the very antithesis of the new spirit of humanity which has marked the Northern Ireland peace process as an outstanding example of people coming together to overcome religious animosity and achieve peace and progress. Unfortunately, the Folklife Festival is enabling this highly partisan group to advance its own sectarian agenda through the presence on the program of two representatives of the Grand Orange Lodge, David Hume and Jonathan Mattison. Of the 107 participants in the program, it appears that Mr. Hume and Mr. Mattison are the only two whose sponsoring body has a stridently political agenda.



For these reasons, the political platform being given to the Grand Orange Lodge by the Smithsonian conveys the wrong message at the wrong time. Its presence would be very hurtful to many Irish and Irish-Americans who have suffered greatly as a direct result of the Grand Orange Lodges history of fostering hatred and bigotry. It is respectfully but urgently requested that the Smithsonians invitation to Mr. Hume and Mr. Mattison, and any other members of the Grand Orange Lodge be withdrawn.



I hope I can count on your support to verbalize your disapproval by contacting your Senators, Congress representatives, other Irish groups, other Irish Americans, media contacts, as well as the Smithsonian directly.



Thanks! See contact list below



Richard Kurin, Director

Center for Folklife and Cultural Heritage

Smithsonian Institution

Email: kurin@si.edu



Nancy Groce, Curator

Smithsonian Institution

Center for Folklife and Cultural Heritage

Email: grocen@si.edu



Diana Parker

Director, Smithsonian Folklife Festival

Email: dianaparker@si.edu



To find your Senator visit www.senate.gov

[Seabird]

AOH Says No to Orangemen in D.C.

June 7, 2007
By Cahir O’Doherty

JACK Meehan, the national president of the AOH in the U.S., has hit out at the Orange Order’s intention to participate in the Smithsonian Museum’s 2007 Folklife Festival in Washington, D.C. The event aims to promote what the festival organizers call “the history, living traditions, and distinctive customs” of Northern Ireland.

During an interview with the Irish Voice, Meehan outlined his objection to the visit. “You can only imagine our shock and dismay when we learned that the Orange Order, the most bigoted, anti-Catholic, anti-Irish organization in Ireland had been invited to participate in this folk festival sponsored by the Smithsonian on the national mall in Washington, D.C.,” Meehan said.

This year for the first time a small delegation from the Orange Order are expected to be among the 160 cross community participants from Northern Ireland scheduled to take part in the annual American tourist expo. Included in the visiting Orange delegation is the Orange banner painter William Magowan from Garvagh, who will be demonstrating his work to the one million visitors who are expected to visit the U.S. capital for this summer’s Smithsonian Folklife event.

Also making the trip are two of the Order’s main historians, Dr. David Hume, the Order’s director of services, and Dr. Jonathan Mattison, a Grand Lodge archivist who will be detailing the history and development of the Order for visitors to the event.

Along with the Order’s official delegations, it is believed other Orangemen will also be traveling to Washington to take part in the festival.

Meehan described the Orange Order’s participation as a “slap in the face for the Nationalist people.”

“I must say that I am deeply disturbed that the Orange Order will be allowed to display their vile brand of sectarian triumphalism here in the nation’s capital during the 4th of July celebration. A victory over the very same brand of religious oppression and bigotry that they openly practice in their Orange Order marches in Ireland.”

If the Smithsonian’s intention was to present a balanced view of the cultural diversity in the north of Ireland they would have extended an invitation to the Nationalist community to participate in the festival, Meehan said.

“They could have invited the AOH, or the Garvaghy Road organization, a credible National-ist organization. They invited the Bogside Artists, who are not a Nationalist group, they’re just artists. They don’t represent the Nationalist community in any way shape or fashion. I’m no aware of any such invitation having been extended to organizations who do,” Meehan added.

Nancy Groce, the Smithsonian’s curator of the Northern Ireland program at the Folklife Festival, disagreed with Meehan’s assessment.

“It’s a cultural program, not a political program,” Groce told the Irish Voice. “We’ve simply invited two historians from the Orange Order, one for the first week and one for the second. We wanted to include their organization in a limited way. That doesn’t mean marching, there’s no tent, there’s no DVD’s — they’re coming as a part of the history of the actual region. We’re not providing them with a political platform.”

Groce admitted that a great deal of careful planning had gone into the festival lineup. “We crafted the whole event with input from all the main cultural groups and political parties in Northern Ireland. We don’t want to do quotas, but the overall balance is equal, including representation from the GAA,” she said.

“We simply wanted to be inclusive and move forward. Now this may or may not work, and we know its an edgy thing to do, but we don’t want a set-up where the Orange Order is facing off any other group.”

The National President of the Irish American Unity Conference (IAUC) John Fogarty struck a conciliatory note concerning the forthcoming festival. “Organizationally we’re not opposed to the Orange Order’s participation. We welcome their participation as long as there’s balanced participation from both sides of the community,” Fogarty said.

This Folklife program is being produced in partnership with the Department of Culture, Arts and Leisure of Northern Ireland and with the cooperation of the Arts Council of Northern Ireland.


Keep the bigoted bastards out of this country!:eek: :D