Has Australia forgotten its Irish past?

IrishHas Australia forgotten its Irish past? It seems a strange question, when iconic buildings such as the Sydney Opera House “green up” for St Patrick’s Day. However, Australians tend not to go in for hyphenated identity, as some Americans do, and do not proclaim their ethnic origins with quite the same “Kiss Me I’m Irish” (or Greek or Italian) swagger. “Thank God for that”, you might well think.

Yet, recognising ancestral roots does not need to be sentimental or kitsch. It helps us learn from our collective history, to understand how cultural and religious encounter can produce new possibilities for being Australian, or can coarsen and polarise into rancour and mistrust.

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