Top ten Irish Studies programs in North America

"clevelander," Boston University, with over 33,000 students, more than 4000 faculty, is the largest private University in the United States. BU is nonsectarian, but historically affiliated with the United Methodist Church. You are mistaking BU for the Jesuit school, Boston College.

Bythebay, I am staying on topic. You are saying that we should stop banging on about the past. So if that's what we should do, why have any history departments in Irish universities at all. Sorry, but Ireland doesn't have an alternate history. There was no Industrial Revolution, there was no Irish Empire, there was no spreading of the Irish language around the world (apart from Scotland, and the Isle of Man), so what do you propose instead?

Geez! I don't believe it. I actually agree with Bythebay for once? Being based in Ireland for 'post-grad.' work would allow travel across Ireland's four provinces:- Ulster/Northern Ireland - Munster/Southern Ireland - Leinster/Eastern Ireland - and Connacht/Western Ireland! And after studying here, they could "move on" (sic) to denying the past and cultivate a fashionable historical amnesia much beloved of contemporary Irish middle-class revisionists. Sometimes factual reflux is purposeful, though. Those who do not remember the past are condemned to repeat it. But then, perhaps that's the agenda after all? Still, live and let live is what I say. I believe Oliver Cromwell wasn't such a bad guy after all. And good company to have a pint of the devil's buttermilk with at your local Tavern in the town. As long as he didn't have a hangover. And he did come from a dysfunctional family also, poor chap.

Just don't tell anyone at Boston U about your past, even if it is for Historical reference.

I mean, why did England develop into such a world power? Is it important to know why? Do we need to know why everybody speaks English and not French or Spanish? Or is only X-factor and the latest i-phone relevant to our lives? How did the i-phone come about? Did it come out of a cardboard box, or is it necessary to know about Alan Turing's machine? Does anyone care as long as they can download their apps? If you don't take and interest in history, you'll probably believe anything you're told.

Well, we could say we have heard ad nauseum about Henry VIII and William the Conquerer and the Great fire of London here in England, but if you lose touch with the past and people don't know anything about the development of the country, that is when you get people rewriting history. If you know nothing about the past, and it's not recorded, how are you going to contradict somebody when they come out with some wacky perspective? You're going to have to take their word for it, if you don't know anything about history (you in a general sense, not addressing you directly with that Bythebay). Those who fail to learn the lessons from history are doomed to repeat them. That is probably one reason why there is so much emigration from Ireland today, just like in the past!

Ireland was one of the greatest, if not the greatest European centres of learning and scholarship in the 12th century. That was before before it suffered repeated invasions from England and all that was ruined, setting the scence for 8 centuries of turmoil. So you see, in order to understand Ireland today, you must look into its distant past and follow the thread until the modern day.

Bythebay, they want to learn about Irish 'culture' from the 12th century. They arent interested in us now.