Author: Verlaque, Amanda
Number Of Pages: 208
Release Date: 01-04-2001
Details: Product Description This collection is all about familiar teenage issues - bullying, peer pressure, family problems, body image, boyfriends - but it also shows how these fairly "ordinary" concerns can be affected by living in an area of conflict. Amazon Review Lurgan Champagne documents 26 different young women's experience of growing up in Northern Ireland, and has been published to coincide with the third anniversary of the Good Friday Agreement. Fearon and Verlaque have successfully gathered together snippets of life from every "side"--Protestant and Catholic, Nationalist and Republican, black and white--as well as those one does not normally associate with Northern Ireland--Jew, traveller, Chinese immigrant. The editors have assumed that readers of this collection will be very new to the Troubles; for some, the footnoted explanations of "Fenians", "crack", the Orange order and other terrorist groups will seem patronising. It may have been better to avoid the footnotes and just included a glossary of terms. The editors have also worked on the premise that those from outside the province assume there is gunfire and atrocities every day. Though this is backed up to a certain extent by the real-life experiences of these young women when they go abroad or to mainland Britain, they assume some ignorance or lack of imagination on the part of their readers. However, Lurgan Champagne works very well as a document of the attitudes and experiences of the young women who have lived with the Troubles all their lives, and shows that whatever their religious or political beliefs, many in Northern Ireland can still strive for their own personal goals or desires. The telling of shootings or terrorist activity is included well into the main narrative of each woman's text; while some have ready tales of dead relatives and terrible kneecappings, others have never encountered such violence or, if they have, no longer think of it. This is a collection that lets the contributors' voices speak for themselves. --Olivia Dickinson
EAN: 9780704349711
Languages: English
Binding: Paperback
Item Condition: UsedVeryGood