Endorsements

Afterlives of the Troubles develops a pioneering critical investigation of subjectivity, culture and the cultural politics of representation as a neglected dimension of conflict transformation in the Northern Irish peace process. Focusing on experiential life stories across a range of forms and storytelling practices, from oral history and published memoir to personal narratives of justice campaigners and collections of community-based storytelling projects, the book investigates the continuing emotional charge and felt significance of conflict memories at an increasing distance from the happenings of the Troubles. In this lengthening temporal 'afterlife' of conflict, conflict experience is not 'past' but haunts the present, and memory carries future-oriented desires for truth, justice and reconciliation. Through detailed interpretive engagement with selected life stories set in their cultural, historical and geographical contexts, the book explores the complex temporal dynamics of 'post-conflict' subjectivities in their endeavour to make sense of remembered experiences of conflict and the feelings attached to them both at the time and afterwards. Researched and written over fifteen years as a series of case studies responding to developments, obstacles and contestations in the evolving peace process seen through this prism of life-storytelling, Afterlives maps a contested history of legacy policy-making and cultural practices engaged in 'dealing with the past', from the establishment of devolution in 2005-7 through to the Legacy and Reconciliation Act of 2023. It is the first book-length investigation into conflict transformation in Northern Ireland from interdisciplinary critical perspectives rooted in historical cultural studies, oral history and popular memory theory.