Gaelic Literature

Overview

Course Outline

Our MA in Gaelic Literature (Online), offered by the Department of Modern Irish at University College Cork Online, provides students with an in-depth introduction to a distinctive body of literature, giving expression to the many identities of the Gaelic world, and extending over 1200 years, from monastic to modern times.

This course will take you on a literary journey across place and time as we examine sources (manuscripts) and literary texts from the early Christian period to the modern era. This emphasis on place –  both local and international – informs the historicity of Gaelic literature studies.

We also create links over time between authors such as Colum Cille and Nuala Ní Dhomhnaill, Gofraidh Fionn and Seán Ó Ríordáin. This allows us to consider Gaelic literature as an organic entity – redefining and reinventing itself as each historic challenge is encountered and overcome.

Course Delivery

The programme is delivered online through English (using texts in translation) by acknowledged experts in the fields of Gaelic language and literature: this coordinated, panoramic approach to the study of Gaelic literature will address and develop the various themes and influences that feed into and inform this literature, including mythology, spiritualism, historic events, landscape, and diasporic studies.

A highlight of our cross-module approach to course content and delivery is the exposure of the student to the primary sources for Gaelic literature, especially manuscript sources in Ireland and abroad. The treatment of the development of Gaelic Ireland as an international entity, and the panoramic approach to the study of Gaelic literature over time are innovative features of this programme.