Curators respond to views that history exhibition in Washington is offensive to the Irish

Wow. I have been a long time supporter/member ($$) of the Smithsonian. I have fond memories, beginning in'78, when my Mom took us down and I was able to walk around Skylab @ the ripe old age of 8. I have seen many wonderful exhibits @ the various galleries there over the years; visiting from NY. The poor judgement and lack of due-dilligence in presenting this exhibit calls into question the integrity of ALL their exhibits. I am disappointed. I will visit DC and if I am unhappy, I will forego any future donations. It is false to claim the integrity of a snippet, as it is but a subset of a whole. While the info should be presented, it should be presented for what it was: a tertiary condition experienced by a few within the context of the whole. It is false to give center stage to a minority condition. It leaves th efalse impression that that was the broader truth, when it was not. Moreover, b/c it implies an idyllic, it demonizes the truth.

brennan and kane,british spin doctors with a distorted completely false view of history.There was nothing benign about these rapacious theiving murdering invaders.refute this twisted lying so called history for the false propoganda it is.

“Seeing the pictures. It seems like you could do a similar exhibit about southern plantation owners, dressed in their fancy clothes, describing them as bringing prosperity to the new world. I'll bet that would bring painful criticism. Why is there such a blindspot when it comes to Ireland?” Excellent point, Searlit. Not to mention that the “prosperity” was the result of stolen land and labor (and in Ireland many other sources of wealth based upon the chroniclers of Cromwell’s larceny of cities alone) which was concentrated into the hands of a few thieving squatters.

Seeing the pictures. It seems like you could do a similar exhibit about southern plantation owners, dressed in their fancy clothes, describing them as bringing prosperity to the new world. I'll bet that would bring painful criticism. Why is there such a blindspot when it comes to Ireland?

Howe much financial support is the Dublin government giving to this farce? Ireland is broke--even one euro would be one euro wasted.

This outfit claims that Kane is "an expert" in the Irish language. Well, I've been around Irish language circles in the US for decades, and I've never heard of him. What has he published in Irish or on Irish? He is most definitely not part of the Irish language community here. I do know that he has links with Notre Dame, so I am not surprised he is involved in a project that seeks to demean Irish nationality--that's par for the course at Notre Dame. I commend Professor Owens for taking a stand against these apologists for mass murder and butchery.

Mr. O'Dowd, you did Folger Shakespeare Library a solid by fostering controversy about its Irish exhibit. Free publicity. Would you consider advocating for its New York City presentation, perhaps Glucksman Irish House?

To John, pope-Donald O'Neyl, King of Ulster, together with the inferior kings and chiefs of that territory, and the whole Irish population: - "Most holy father-We here transmit to you some exact and candid particulars concerning the state of our nation and the wrongs which our forefathers have suffered, and we are suffering, from the kings of England, from their agents, and from the English barons born in Ireland. After driving us by violence from our spacious habitations, from our fields, from our paternal inheritances, and compelling us, in order to save our lives to make our abode in the mountains, the marshes, the woods, and the hollows of the rocks, they are now incessantly harrassing us in these miserable retreats, to expel us from them, and appropriate to themselves the whole extent of our country.

I'm looking forward eagerly to Thomas Herron and Brendan Kane's next projects which I assume are to be "Renaissance Iraq" and "Renaissance Afghanistan" with tasteful pictures of fast food and coffee outlets, CIA drones and black sites and puppet governments

apparently these historians limit themselves to review of documents. All one has to do in Ireland is go from ruined monastery to ruined monastery in western Ireland, as I have,to observe the stark shells of what one were seats of learning. Much of the destruction is attributed to Henry VIII and his minions. You don't need to read books, just observe the reality.

The Ulster Plantation: how can it be characterized as anything but ethnic cleansing and the establishment of a politically, sectarian and ethnically reliable population in Ireland.

The Penal Laws were put in place starting in 1607. The Ulster colonization by Scots-English reivers began at the same time. Would someone say that the period after imposition of the Nuremberg Laws was often one of German-Jewish cooperation?