Sightlines: Beyond the Beyond in Ireland

It is the 1960s, and Ireland is hoping to join what will later become the European Union. The government has devised a plan to stem emigration and save the Irish language by supporting small factories in the Gaeltacht, traditional Irish-speaking villages in remote western areas. But is the plan working?

With her signature humor and charm, Eileen Kane transports the reader to County Donegal with a detailed account of rural Irish life during this period of rapid change. This is a story about people living beyond the margins of maps, boundaries, language groups, and government departments – people bound by borders that have little or no correspondence to their own cultural, economic, and historical margins. Ultimately, it is a story about life on the edges, and the places and people who fall outside them.