Dr Niall Whelehan
Senior Lecturer
History
Personal statement
My research and teaching focus on the nineteenth and twentieth centuries and themes of migration, political violence, activism, nationalism and colonialism, mainly relating to Ireland and the Irish diaspora. I completed my doctorate at the European University Institute, Florence. Before coming to 51cg, I worked at Bielefeld University, Germany, the University of Glaway and the University of Edinburgh. I am presently the Head of the History Subject Area at 51cg.
My recent book Changing Land: Diaspora Activism and the Irish Land War (NYU Press, 2021) is based on research supported by a Marie Sk艂odowska-Curie Intra-European Fellowship and examines radical networks in Ireland and Irish migrant communities in Scotland, England, the United States and Argentina. My first book, The Dynamiters: Irish nationalism and political violence in the wider world, 1867-1900, appeared with Cambridge University Press in 2012.
My present project is a book length study of Irish migration to Argentina and the south Atlantic world more widely in the long nineteenth centiry, and in particular of John O'Dwyer Creaghe, an Irish emigrant who became a leading figure in the Argentine anarchist movement.
Alongside this, I am working on a collabortive project on demography, excess mortality and public health in nineteenth century Ireland.
I am part of the Modern Irish History Group at 51cg. I teach classes on the history of the Irish diaspora, the global history of terrorism, Irish nationalism and radicalism, and Ireland and colonialism, at undergraduate and postgraduate levels.
Along with teaching and research, I鈥檓 committed to public history. I am part of the Bring Your Own Hammer collaboration between historians and musicians. Bring Your Own Hammer is a faction rather than a band, group or collective: where nineteenth-century factions gathered armed with sticks at fairs, this one is armed with voices and instruments, set on reinterpreting historical material in song, and recovering, or carefully imagining, the inner lives of people who survive only as snippets in the archive. The of original compositions - My Grief on the Sea - was released in March 2024, and the second album, From The Tombs, will be released in late-2026.
I am interested in the interpretation of history through music and film. For a number of years I organised the series 'Screening Irish History', which has run at the Glasgow Film Theatre, the CCA Glasgow and Edinburgh鈥檚 Filmhouse.
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/humanities/departmentofhumanities/history/modernirishhistory/
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Publications
- , McLaughlin Eoin
- Journal of Urban History (2026)
- 34 (2026)
- America in Ireland Culture and Society, 1841鈥�1925 (2025) (2025)
- , McMahon Richard
- A Tract for Our Times A Retrospective on Joe Lee鈥檚 Ireland 1912鈥�1985 (2024) (2024)
- McLaughlin Eoin,
- (2024)
- 30 (2022)
Teaching
I teach undergraduate and postgraduate modules on the history of Ireland, the Irish diaspora, the history of political violence and terrorism, and the history of colonialism. I teach the final year special subject 'Global Histories of Terrorism: Case Studies and Comparisons from the Modern Era'; the year 3/4 module 'The Irish Diaspora 1800-2025', and the postgraduate module 'Ireland, Colonialism and Anti-colonialism'. I also contribute to our first and second year survey modules.听
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I welcome applications from potential MRes and PhD students who wish to work in the areas of:
- modern Ireland
- the Irish diaspora
- migration
- terrorism and political violence
- Ireland and empire
- Cinema and Irish history
Professional Activities
- Contributor
- 19/6/2026
- Speaker
- 9/2/2026
- Keynote speaker
- 21/6/2025
- Examiner
- 4/12/2024
- Speaker
- 25/11/2024
- Speaker
- 1/11/2024
Projects
- Lively, Anna (Principal Investigator) Whelehan, Niall (Academic)
- What role did Irish women play in the global spread of anti-communism between 1919 and 1939? This project investigates the diversity of Irish women鈥檚 anti-communist activism, including through connections with right-wing groups in the Irish diaspora in Britain, the US and Australia. It focuses on a critical period in the development of global anti-communism, spanning from the Irish War of Independence and the first US Red Scare to the Spanish Civil War. Combining transnational history with gender studies鈥� approaches, this project analyses a neglected form of Irish women鈥檚 political participation and examines the politics of gender on the right.
- 01-Jan-2024 - 31-Jan-2027
- Whelehan, Niall (Principal Investigator)
- 01-Jan-2023 - 28-Jan-2025
- Whelehan, Niall (Principal Investigator)
- 01-Jan-2023 - 30-Jan-2025
- Whelehan, Niall (Co-investigator)
- AHRC Collaborative Doctoral Award 2021-2025. This supervisor-led studentship application was led by Prof. Kirstie Blair, with myself as second supervisor, and the Scottish Maritime Museum. The student (Ronan McGreechin) was selected after interview. (拢72K).
- 01-Jan-2021 - 26-Jan-2026
- Whelehan, Niall (Co-investigator)
- Bring Your Own Hammer brings historians and composers together to create new and original songs based on historical sources and to re-interpret song material rooted in the history of nineteenth-century Ireland and of the Irish Diaspora. It is a project dedicated to the re-interpretation of historical material in song form. The reach and significance of the project鈥檚 impact is substantial, aiming to change perceptions of Irish history and migration history in new ways.
- 01-Jan-2020 - 31-Jan-2027
- Whelehan, Niall (Principal Investigator)
- 50% share on successful supervisor-led AHRC Collaborative Doctoral Award studentship application, 拢72K. The studentship began on 1 October 2019, the student selected after interview is Niamh Coffey. (Co-supervised with the University of Edinburgh).
- 01-Jan-2019 - 30-Jan-2023