The Hallowed Eve: Dimensions of Culture in a Calendar Festival in Northern Ireland

by Jack Santino

Overview

Halloween is such a major celebration in Ireland that it is often called the Irish Christmas, a day of family reunions, meals, and fun.

In America, many of our contemporary traditions are thought to have been brought over by Irish immigrants. But Northern Irish Halloween traditions today are nearly the opposite of American ones, with the emphasis on storytelling, family fireworks, and community bonfires rather than on pranks and peer-group activities.

Halloween has become the one safe haven in this troubled country when social conflict is set aside. Although current folk and popular traditions have the potential to be interpreted in divisive terms, there seems to be an unspoken agreement that this holiday must remain free from sectarianism. Halloween in Northern Ireland provides an ideal model of how life could be.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780813184586
Publisher:	University Press of Kentucky
Publication date:	10/21/2021
Series:	Irish Literature, History, and Culture
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
Pages:	184
File size:	1 MB
Age Range:	18 Years

About the Author

Jack Santino, professor of popular culture at Bowling Green State University, is author of All Around the Year: Holidays and Celebrations in American Life and editor of the Journal of American Folklore.

Editorial Reviews

Drawing on extensive interviews, Santino (popular culture, U. of Bowling Green State) examines the various customs that mark the celebration of Halloween through the lenses of gender, ethnicity, and religious affiliation. The focus is on how the tradition could be a nonthreatening, celebratory model for life in Northern Ireland. Annotation c. by Book News, Inc., Portland, Or.

Booknews

The definitive look as the uniquely Irish origins of Halloween.

Green Man Review

Santino's past work has associated him as firmly with the American celebration of Halloween as witches, black cats, and vampires. The Hallowed Eve will broaden readers' understanding of the holiday as celebrated in Northern Ireland, and explode some piously held beliefs concerning the relationship of the American and Irish holidays as thoroughly as an M-80 in a jack-o-lantern.

Erika Brady

The history and ways the Irish celebrate are interesting to read about and let us know more about the culture of the Irish, yesterday and today.

Ohioana Quarterly

Depicts a tradition that is not just a celebration but, in a sense, a time of community healing, even if only for one day a year.

Ozarks Mountaineer

The variety of Halloween folklore and customs that Santino presents is a window into culture. As such, The Hallowed Eve is often more instructive about fundamental and everyday dimensions of life in Northern Ireland than simplistic, journalistic images of a hopelessly bigoted and war-torn province broadcast to the wider world.

New Hibernia Review

An excellent and incisive probe into what a festival means to a separated culture and how it succeeds, though only for a day, in bringing the two warring factions of Northern Ireland together.

Journal of Popular Culture

"An excellent and incisive probe into what a festival means to a separated culture and how it succeeds, though only for a day, in bringing the two warring factions of Northern Ireland together." -- Journal of Popular Culture

"Depicts a tradition that is not just a celebration but, in a sense, a time of community healing, even if only for one day a year." -- Ozarks Mountaineer

"Santino's past work has associated him as firmly with the American celebration of Halloween as witches, black cats, and vampires. The Hallowed Eve will broaden readers' understanding of the holiday as celebrated in Northern Ireland, and explode some piously held beliefs concerning the relationship of the American and Irish holidays as thoroughly as an M-80 in a jack-o-lantern." -- Erika Brady

"The definitive look as the uniquely Irish origins of Halloween." -- Green Man Review

"The history and ways the Irish celebrate are interesting to read about and let us know more about the culture of the Irish, yesterday and today." -- Ohioana Quarterly

"The variety of Halloween folklore and customs that Santino presents is a window into culture. As such, The Hallowed Eve is often more instructive about fundamental and everyday dimensions of life in Northern Ireland than simplistic, journalistic images of a hopelessly bigoted and war-torn province broadcast to the wider world." -- New Hibernia Review

From the Publisher