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Faculties & Departments
Research Clusters
Urban/Suburban Studies
Our research goals are to integrate empirical engagement with everyday life in urban, rural and suburban contexts with contemporary theoretical debates in the humanities and social sciences. This broad canvas enables us to engage in a range of studies that include explorations of the overlapping networks that link people together and organise social relations; the analysis of the quality of everyday civic and social life in middle class suburbs and in marginal housing estates; the configuration of the suburban front garden and the nature and impact of urban protest. We currently have 5 staff and 8 research postgraduates engaged in projects in the urban/suburban field.
News and Events
The Urban/Suburban cluster will co-sponsor three seminars in the Spring 2007 seminar series:
Alan Grossman and Aine O’Brien, The Centre for Transcultural Research and Media Practice, will screen their new documentary film on Immigrants in Dublin “Here To Stay” (72 mins), followed by a Question and Answer Session (co-sponsored with the Department of Anthropology)
Michael Punch, UCD will speak on “The Inequities underpinning the Irish housing system” March 12, 2007 (co-sponsored with NIRSA)
Shane O’Toole, Director of the Irish Architectural Foundation, and curator of the Irish entry to the Venice Biennial 2006 will speak on “SubUrban to SuperRural- blueprints for the built environment in Ireland” (to be confirmed, co-sponsored with NIRSA)
Cluster Members and Research Interests
Mary P. Corcoran
Jane Gray
Deirdre Kirke
Michel Peillon
Eamonn Slater
Mary P. Corcoran’s research and teaching interests lie primarily in the fields of urban sociology, although she has also researched migration and professional media cultures. She has participated in a number of national and international research projects exploring aspects of the urban environment, from quality of life in social housing to urban regeneration and the significance of place. She is a co-investigator along with Michel Peillon and Jane Gray on “The New Urban Living” project (should have a link with to one page summary of project and some relevant publications). Currently, she is developing a project on citizenship and public culture (see below under new projects).
Jane Gray research interests include, life course patterns and suburban development, extended families and networks of social support in suburban communities and family-work strategies and the texture of suburban social life. She is a co-investigator along with Michel Peillon and Mary P. Corcoran on “The New Urban Living” project.
Michel Peillon’s research interests relevant to this cluster include the social appropriation of urban space and protests (see under projects below). He is a co-investigator along with Mary P. Corcoran and Jane Gray on “The New Urban Living” project (should have a link with to one page summary of project and some relevant publications).
Eamonn Slater is particularly interested in the effect that car dependency is having on Irish society. Especially significant is how social relationships are being increasingly mediated through the technology of the car. And as a consequence, these new emerging social relationships become spatialised in the changing structures of the built environment. These new spatial structures manifest themselves in the forms of roads, shopping centres, petrol stations, leisure centres, industrial and business parks and suburban domestic homes. The crucial link between these new ‘auto’ spaces is the car. Therefore, the car is the dynamic element in the expansion of Irish suburbia. It is at this juncture, that I am concentrating my research efforts.
Recent publications by Departmental Staff Relevant to Cluster Research
Joint publications
Corcoran, Mary P., Jane Gray, and Michel Peillon, Suburban Ireland, manuscript in preparation
Corcoran, Mary P. and Jane Gray and Michel Peillon, “Ties that Bind? The Social Fabric of Daily Life in New Suburbs”, in T. Fahey, H. Russell and C. Whelan (eds.), Best of Times. forthcoming
Peillon, Michel, Mary P. Corcoran and Jane Gray. 2006. Civic Engagement and the Governance of Irish Suburbs. Studies in Public Policy 21. Dublin: The Policy Institute at Trinity College Dublin.
Corcoran, Mary P., Jane Gray and Michel Peillon. 2003. “Local Sentiment and Sense of Place in a New Suburban Community.” Pp. 146-159 in M. Breen, E. Conway, B. McMillan, eds. Technology and Transcendence. Dublin: Columba Press.
Individual publications relevant to this cluster
Corcoran, Mary P. ‘Urban partnership and community development: a European perspective’ forthcoming in Economic and Social Review, Special issue on governance, 2006
Corcoran, Mary P. ‘The Spectacle of the Spire- re-inventing Dublin’s O’Connell Street’ in Sociologie et Societes, Special Issue on “Le Spectacle Des Villes”, Vol. XXXVII, No. 1, Printempos 2005 pp. 69-86
Corcoran, Mary P. ‘Social support networks in impoverished European neighbourhoods: case studies from Italy and Ireland’ (with Manuela Olgenora and Antonella Meo) in European Societies, 7(1) 2005: 53-79.
Corcoran, Mary P. ‘Place attachment and community sentiment in marginalised neighbourhoods: a European case study’ in the Canadian Journal of Urban Research, Volume 11, Issue 1, Summer 2002. Pp. 47-68
Corcoran, Mary P. ‘Re-imagining the built environment: place, community and neighbourhood in the city of Dublin’ in F. O’Toole (ed) Re-imagining Ireland, Charlottesville, VA: University of Virginia Press, 2006 in press.
Corcoran, Mary P. ‘Housing in Ireland’ (with Patrick Duffy and Karen Keaveney) in B. Bartley and R. Kitchin (eds) Understanding Contemporary Ireland. London: Pluto Press, 2006 in press.
Corcoran, Mary P. ‘Ethno-city’ in M.P. Corcoran and M. Peillon (eds) Uncertain Ireland. Institute of Public Administration, 2006 pp. 181-192
Corcoran, Mary P. ‘The regeneration of Fatima Mansions: lessons from Dublin’ pp. 221-140 in Peter Herrle and Uwe-Jens Walther (eds) Socially Inclusive Cities: emerging concepts and practices. Munster, Germany: LIT Verlag, 2005. pp.221-240
Corcoran, Mary P. ‘Place remaking in Dublin’ in M. Peillon and M.P. Corcoran (eds) Place and non-place. Dublin: Institute of Public Administration, 2004, pp. 142-156
Corcoran, Mary P. ‘On the Waterfront’ in M.P. Corcoran and M.Peillon (eds) Ireland Unbound: A turn of the century chronicle. Dublin: Institute of Public Administration 2002 pp. 200-214
Peillon, Michel, “Exclusionary protests in urban Ireland”, City, 6, 2 (2002): 193-204.
Peillon, Michel. “The making of the Dublin conurbation”, in M. Peillon and M.P. Corcoran (eds.), Place and non-place. The reconfiguration of Ireland. Dublin: Institute of Public Administration, 2004
Peillon, Michel. “A conurban epic”, In Alan Phelan (curator), Felons. Dublin: Royal Hibernian Academy, 2005.
Peillon, Michel. “Coffee aromas”, in M.P. Corcoran and M. Peillon (eds.), Uncertain Ireland. A sociological chronicle 2003-2004. Dublin: Institute of Public Administration, 2006.
Eamonn Slater, ‘The M50: A ‘Lugly’ Construct’, 2006, in Uncertain Ireland, edited by M. Corcoran and M. Peillon. Dublin: Institute of Public Administration.
Postgraduate Research Supervision Interests of Cluster Members
Urban regeneration, public space, cars and mobility, social movements, social protest. Social identities. Transformation of families and households; gender, family work strategies and social change.
Postgraduate Research Students in Cluster and Thesis Titles
James P. Hogan “Urban regeneration regimes and community responses in docklands Dublin”
Tracey Warner “Working class communities responses to new immigrants”
Mary Phipps. “From housewife to ‘domestic goddess’ and beyond. What is the significance of women’s role as food providers in a contemporary Irish context?”
Ann Dalton. “Ageing in place. Exploring the significance of the family as a site for ageing in Ireland.”
Completed PhD Theses in the Cluster Area
Ruth Casey, 2006, ‘The ‘Suburban Imaginary’: restructuring the rural village in Ireland and France’.
Mary Benson, 2006, ‘Changing Cityscapes and the process of contemporary gentrification: an examination of the transformation of Ringsend within the context of post-industrial growth in Dublin.’
Teaching by Staff related to the Cluster
a. Undergraduate:
SO211: Urban Sociology (Michel Peillon and Mary P. Corcoran)
SO102 – Understanding Modern Ireland: The Sociology of a changing society. (Eamonn Slater and Michel Peillon).
SO303 – Car Mediation and the expanding social relationships of Suburbia: ‘the auto sprawl regime’ (Eamonn Slater)
SO303- Community- Dead or alive in twenty-first century Ireland?. (Mary P. Corcoran)
b. Postgraduate:
SO404-Social Movements (Michel Peillon)
SO405 - Changing Cityscapes (Mary P. Corcoran)
SO406 – Ireland as a Global Spectacle. (Eamonn Slater)
Current Research Projects
The social appropriation of urban space (Michel Peillon)
I am particularly interested in the social appropriation of urban space: the way urban residents make the city their own. I am planning other small research projects, along the following lines:
- The use of urban public space
- The way the urban locality becomes meaningful: the naming of places, landmarks, the level of identification of people with a locality; the different mappings of the city, etc.
- The individualisation of urban spaces: gardens; windows as projection of identity; territorialisation, etc.
- Idiosyncratic uses of urban space: the way recreational spaces are being used, spaces of consumption, etc.
- Strategies for marking the distinctive features of a locality.
- Protest and resistance. Resistance to unwelcome developments takes many forms, from stating disapproval, refusing to identify with the place, moving elsewhere, ritual protests to possibly full-scale social movements. A sensitive study of these forms of resistance would go a long way in understanding how Dubliners, for instance, relate to their city and make it their own.
Protests (Michel Peillon)
For seven years now, I have systematically recorded all protest events that have come to my attention. The register constitutes a rich database that I exploit on a regular basis. This research interest is also linked with the urban theme which I have embraced and endeavour to develop in the Irish context. I intend to undertake a comparative analysis of important social movements in Dublin's recent past (the Hume Street movement; Civic Quay protests; the anti-water-charge movement; the anti-drugs movements, etc.).
Public space and public culture (Mary P. Corcoran)
A commitment to the ideas of social inclusion and social justice, requires that we embrace all facets of life including the economic, social and cultural domains. While considerable attention has been paid to the ideas of economic marginalisation and social exclusion in the Irish context, there has been much less focus on the idea of cultural exclusion. The aim of this research project is to analyse the issue of culture from the perspective of social inclusion, and to suggest ways in which cultural policy can be promoted as a mechanism toward creating greater equality in Irish society. As a corollary, the project will address culture’s role in supporting new understandings of citizenship and civic participation in a global era.
The objectives of the research are:
- To establish whether there is a role for culture in combating social exclusion.
- To ascertain whether or not there are tangible benefits in terms of raising aspirations, improving educational attainment, reducing anti-social behaviour that can be directly attributed to targeted arts/cultural interventions.
- To establish what we know about existing initiatives aimed at cultural inclusion and assess how they have worked.
- To review how such interventions and initiatives are measured.
- To ascertain whether or not access to cultural resources enhance quality of life in marginalized communities.
- To ascertain whether or not access to cultural resources help to enhance civic identity and civic engagement.
- To generate public interest arguments on the issue of whether or not culture has a role to play in strengthening civility and active citizenship.
Completed Research Projects
New Urban Living Study (Corcoran, Gray and Peillon)
Ballymun Oral History Project (Cox)
ENTRUST Neighbourhood regeneration project (EU Network 2002-2004) Final Report
Intellectual Community
Departmental Seminars in this Cluster in Recent Years
Using case studies to investigate the dynamics of territorial generative growth
Amanda Haynes,
University of Limerick
Monday, Dec 13th, 2004
Society and Nature:Benjamin and Marx on the front lawn
Eamonn Slater, NUIM
Monday, Dec 6thh, 2004
Self-sustaining information and communication technology initiatives within remote rural communities
Sarah Skerratt,
University of Newcastle Upon Tyne
Monday, Feb 14th, 2005
Social networks and social exclusion in later life: assessing the research evidence
Professor Chris Phillipson, Keele University
Monday, March 7th, 2005
Professor Chris Phillipson is Director of the Centre for Social Gerontology at Keele University. He has a specialist interest in the sociology and social policy of family life in old age, and has researched and published extensively in that area.
Punishment, pathology and homelessness: defining male homelessness in the United States
Teresa Gowan, University of Manchester and University of Minnesota.
Monday, April 4th, 2005
Colloquia, Conferences and other events related to the Cluster
Two successful conferences were organised under the auspices of this cluster: Urbanism and Suburbanism at the fin de siecle (1999) and Civic and Social Life in the Suburbs (2005). Both included international speakers and attracted large audiences.
Joint conference presentations
Eamonn Slater and Mary P. Corcoran, ‘Place attachment in a theme park: excavating the Irish urban landscape’ paper read at the 33rd Annual Conference of the Sociological Association of Ireland, Sligo May 5-7th, 2006.
Michel Peillon, Mary P. Corcoran Jane Gray, “Neighbourhood and Social Capital”, paper giving at a seminar on Best of Times? at the Economic Social and Research Institute, 16 January 2006
Michel Peillon, M.P. Corcoran and Jane Gray, “Civic engagement in Irish suburbs. A profile and policy implications”, The Policy Institute seminar, Trinity College Dublin, 27 May 2003.
Corcoran, Mary P. with Jane Gray and Michel Peillon ‘Civic and Social Life in the Suburbs’ paper presented at the “Volunteering and Philanthropy-Research from Ireland, North and South” conference, sponsored by the Royal Irish Academy Third Sector Programme, NICVA, Belfast November 24th, 2005
Gray, Jane and Mary P. Corcoran, ‘Social life in the new suburbs: preliminary findings from a comparative study’ presented at the Sociological Association of Ireland, 31st Annual Conference April 23-25, 2004
Corcoran, Mary P. ‘Local sentiment and sense of place in a new suburban community’ (with Michel Peillon and Jane Gray) Paper presented at the European Congress of Rural Sociologists, Institute of Technology, Sligo August 24th, 2003 Paper at ESRC, August 24, 2003
Individual conference presentations
Michel Peillon, “Exclusionary protests in urban Ireland”, Writing the City Conference, LSB College, Dublin, 24-27 August 2001.
Michel Peillon, “A tale of four suburbs: Social resources at the periphery". Symposium on Civic and Social Life in the Suburbs, April 8th, 2005
Corcoran, Mary P. ‘Finding your place: forging an identity and sense of belonging in suburban communities’ paper presented at International Symposium on “Civic and Social Life in the Suburbs” NUI Maynooth, April 8th, 2005
Corcoran, Mary P. ‘Urban partnership and community development: a European perspective’ paper presented at Social partnership- a new kind of governance? Conference, NUI Maynooth, 14-15 September, 2004
Corcoran, Mary P. ‘Policy recommendations on public-private collaboration in integrated urban regeneration’ presented at Involving the private sector in regeneration partnerships, ENTRUST Euroconference, Hamburg, June 7-8, 2004
Public Sociology
Initiatives based on joint authorship
Michel Peillon, Jane Gray and Mary P. Corcoran submission to the Taskforce on Active citizenship (October 2006)
Michel Peillon, Mary P. Corcoran and Jane Gray, “Some policy implications of the New Urban Living Study”, Presentation to public meeting organised by the Meath Community and Voluntary Steering Group, Ratoath 18th October 2006
Mary P.Corcoran, Jane Gray and Michel Peillon “The changing suburban landscape in Ireland” Address to the Wicklow Chamber of Commerce annual dinner, Arklow Bay Hotel, October 20th, 2006
Mary P.Corcoran Jane Gray and Michel Peillon “Civic and social life in the Suburbs” paper presented at Salon on Suburban Culture, ERASMUSpc, Dublin City Centre, October 14th, 2006
Mary P.Corcoran, Jane Gray and Michel Peillon ‘The role of the village in creating a ‘local structure of feeling’: evidence from the suburban periphery’ paper presented at Who has designs on our villages? The Future of Ireland’s Villages- economic, environmental heritage and social implications conference, The Heritage Council, Durrow Co. Laois, June 28th, 2005
Mary P.Corcoran, Jane Gray and Michel Peillon, “Community and social change: the view from the suburbs” presented at panel on “Throwing down the gauntlet: challenges for community well being” The Dublin City Development Board/Dublin City Council, Communities First Summit, Dublin May 31-June 1, 2005
Mary P.Corcoran. Jane Gray and Michel Peillon “Civic and Social Life in the Suburbs” Fianna Fail Cumann, Maynooth, Co. Kildare May 17th, 2005
Mary P.Corcoran, Jane Gray and Michel Peillon, ‘Community Context and social change in Ireland: the view from suburbia’, Keynote paper presented Art, Community and Context- the terms of engagement, at Liberty Hall, Dublin April 29th, 2004. Jointly organised by engage Scotland, the City Arts Centre and IMMA.
Michel Peillon, consultant to the Association of Municipal Authorities of Ireland in relation to their submission to the Taskforce on Active citizenship. (October 2006).
Mary P. Corcoran, submission on cultural inclusion to the Taskforce on Active Citizenship, (October 2006)
Mary P.Corcoran ‘Edge city? The Abbey Talks- invited lecture in the national theatre’s programme of talks in response to the work on stage, The Peacock Theatre, May 17th, 2006.
Mary P.Corcoran “Art, nature and understandings of place” paper presented at the Sculpture in Woodland residential seminar on the relationship between public art and public space. Sponsored by Coillte, Devils’ Glen, Wicklow, Sept 12th- 14th, 2006
Mary P.Corcoran ‘Public Private partnerships in urban regeneration’ paper presented to the NorDubCo -The North Dublin Development Coalition seminar series, Dublin City University, November 4th, 2004
Mary P.Corcoran ‘Neighbourhood, community and sense of place: a view from the margins’ Invited keynote speaker, Irish Council for Social Housing, Biennial National Conference September 30, 2003.
Mary P. Corcoran is a Taoiseach’s nominee to the National Economic and Social Forum since 2004 where she serves on the Management Committee. She is also a Board member of the City Arts Centre.
Members of the Urban/suburban cluster frequently comment on relevant sociological issues on the national and local media.
For further information contact:
Mary P. Corcoran, Department of Sociology, NUI Maynooth, Maynooth, Co.Kildare or email mary.Corcoran@nuim.ie