George Freedley Book Award finalist
A little over a century ago, the Irish in America were the targets of intense xenophobic anxiety. Much of that anxiety centered on their mobility, whether that was traveling across the ocean to the U.S., searching for employment in urban centers, mixing with other ethnic groups, or forming communities of their own. Granshaw argues that American variety theatre, a precursor to vaudeville, was a crucial battleground for these anxieties, as it appealed to both the fears and the fantasies that accompanied the rapid economic and social changes of the Gilded Age.
鈥淕ranshaw鈥檚 work provides a readable history of how movement helped Irish Americans navigate the complicated nineteenth century world, while simultaneously spotlighting the way movement continues to offer ways to negotiate our twenty-first-century world.鈥濃Theatre Journal
鈥淲hile much has been written previously about some of the variety theatre that Granshaw explores, no one has done what she has done. She is introducing a revelatory new voice to the literature, one that expands previous understandings of antebellum theatre and performance and at the same time contributes to contemporary research in the humanities about power and migration.鈥濃擡lizabeth Reitz Mullenix, Miami University
鈥淕ranshaw鈥檚 new book is an imaginative, incisive examination of Irish American mobility in popular theatre, showing how popular culture and revolutionary politics shaped each other.鈥濃擬. Alison Kibler, author, Censoring Racial Ridicule: Irish, Jewish, and African American Struggles over Race and Representation
鈥淏oth timely and relevant, Irish on the Move is an important contribution to theatre historiography, but the book will also interest readers seeking to understand the historical roots of nationalist, anti-immigrant, white supremacist discourse in the contemporary United States.鈥濃擜my E. Hughes, author, Spectacles of Reform: Theater and Activism in Nineteenth-Century America
鈥泪苍&苍产蝉辫;Irish on the Move, the journey of the immigrant to claim the right to be here, which is resisted by the dominant culture, results in a kind of dance that changes both the immigrant and the local population. Granshaw鈥檚 research is impressive and this book makes an important contribution to Irish American history.鈥濃擳ice Miller, author, Entertaining the Nation: American Drama in the Eighteenth and Nineteenth Centuries
鈥Irish on the Move shows how the acts of stage tramps, variety shows, and even competitive pedestrians shaped the lives and perceptions of America鈥檚 mobile and networked Irish, while contributing to America鈥檚 distinctive theatre culture.鈥濃擯eter P. Reed, author, Rogue Performances: Staging the Underclasses in Early American Theatre Culture
George Freedley Memorial Award Finalist, 2020
