2023 Faculty of Arts, Celtic Studies & Philosophy Dean's Lecture

Wednesday, October 25, 2023 - 18:30
Iontas Building, Maynooth University

"The Open Island? Ireland in the More-Than-Human World"

Maynooth University is delighted to welcome Professor Michael Cronin to campus to deliver the Faculty of Arts, Celtic Studies & Philosophy 2023 Dean's Lecture.

Register here before 23rd October for this free event which is open to all.

The French philosopher Gilles Deleuz, in the title text of a posthumous collection of essays Dessert Island (2004), makes a distinction between two kinds of islands; continental islands and oceanic islands. In what promises to be a thought-provoking lecture, Professor Cronin will explore where we situate the island of Ireland in the post-Brexit world, is it more continental or oceanic? In the context of the climate emergency (rising sea levels, increased flooding, coastal erosion), this lecture will argue for the urgent necessity to place this question of islandness at the heart of our cultural and political thinking and ask ourselves, what kind of island future we want; the island as a place of cultural and political possibility or as an outpost of environmental degradation and cognitive confinement.

The lecture will begin sharp at 6.30pm on Wednesday, 25th October, in Iontas Lecture Theatre - Google map link to Iontas Building is here. Registration desk will be open from 6pm and refreshments will be available after the lecture finishes at 7.30pm until 8.30pm.

We look forward to extending a warm welcome to all to the 2023 FACSP Dean's Lecture. Register here.

Professor Michael Cronin

Biography
Michael Cronin received his BA from Trinity College Dublin, his MA from University College Dublin and his PhD from Trinity College Dublin. He has taught in universities in France and Ireland and has held Visiting Research Fellowships to universities in Canada, Belgium, Peru, France and Egypt. He is a Fellow of Trinity College Dublin, an elected Member of the Royal Irish Academy and the Academia Europaea, an Officer in the Ordre des Palmes Académiques and a Senior Researcher in the Trinity Centre for Literary and Cultural Translation.

Research
Michael Cronin is the author of 13 monographs, the co-editor of seven edited collections and the author of over 150 refereed articles and book chapters. His work has been translated into 16 languages including Arabic, Mandarin Chinese, Korean and Modern Greek. Among his published works are Across the Lines: travel, language, translation (Cork University Press, 2000), Translation and Globalization (Routledge, 2006), Translation and Identity (Routledge, 2006), The Expanding World: towards a politics of microspection (Zero Books, 2012), Translation in the Digital Age (Routledge, 2013), Eco-Translation: translation and ecology in the Age of the Anthropocene (Routledge, 2017), Irish and Ecology/An Ghaeilge agus an Éiceolaíocht (FÁS, 2019) and Eco-Travel: journeying in the Anthropocene (Cambridge University Press, 2022). His research interests are in the areas of eco-criticism, travel writing, translation theory and history, Irish Studies and Quebec and Acadian Studies.