The Queen's University of Belfast | Ulster-Scots Society

Free Concert at Queen's

2009-03-12T18:08:00.001Z

Ulster-Scots Concert - Monday 16th March 2009 - Start time 7.45pm - GREAT HALL, QUEEN'S UNIVERSITY BELFAST

FREE ENTRY

All welcome

Acts include:

Thistledown Dance Group, from Kilkeel

Risin Stour - Ulster-Scots Folk group

Hounds of Ulster

There will also be a short talk given on Patrick by Gordon Lucy (Ulster Scoiety)

Bard’s spirit still potent 250 years after his birth

2009-01-28T16:46:00.001Z

BY Rebecca Black

IRISH NEWS
22/01/09

People around the world are preparing to recite poetry in praise of the haggis before raising a wee dram to Rabbie Burns on the 250th anniversary of his birth. Rebecca Black reports

Men in kilts, a rise in whisky sales and misty-eyed recitals of Scottish poetry. It can only mean one thing – the annual celebration of Robert Burns.

While few people expect to be so fondly remembered a century after their death, in 1795 Burns confidently prophesied to his wife Jean Armour: “Ay, Jean, they’ll think more of me in a hundred years after this.”

While this weekend marks 250 years since the Scottish bard was born, it is clear that – like the amber-coloured drink he loved – his spirit has lost none of its potency.

Born in Alloway, Ayrshire, on January 25 1759, Burns lived a relatively brief but colourful life before dying aged 37 of rheumatic fever, the same day his wife gave birth to a son.

He stayed until the age of seven in a house built by his farmer father William (now the Burns Cottage Museum). Then his family were forced to sell up and take up a tenancy.

There, as the eldest of seven, Burns experienced a life of poverty.

The severe manual labour of the farm left its traces in a premature stoop and weakened constitution.

With little time for regular schooling, he received much of his education from his father, who despite their circumstances believed strongly in its importance.

Flourishing despite this difficult upbringing, Burns made his name with an uncanny ability to observe everyday life.

He wrote in Scots and standard English and one of his best-known pieces is Auld Lang Syne, traditionally sung at Hogmanay, as well as Scots Wha Hae, which for a

long time served as an unofficial national anthem.

Gordon Lucy, director of the Ulster Society at Queen’s University Belfast, contends that Burns speaks to everyone – from Ireland to the United States and Russia.

“Burns was very popular in the former Soviet Union through the translations. By 1964 he had sold more than a million copies,” he said.

“In 1787 James Magee of Bridge Street, Belfast, published the first edition of Burns’s poetry outside Scotland.

“This is a measure of Burns’s popularity in Ulster.”

Mr Lucy said that, while the poetry was published with a glossary to help explain the language, it was not needed in Ireland.

“In Ulster, volumes of Burns are found with the poems well thumbed but the glossary in almost pristine condition,” he said.

“Quite simply, Ulster people understood Burns’s vocabulary. Many of them even spoke the same language.”

Today, Belfast hosts one of the finest collections of Burns material in the world, courtesy of Belfast-based businessman Andrew Gibson, originally from Ayrshire, who donated it to the Linen Hall Library.

As well as boasting many fans in Ireland, Burns also had relatives who moved across the Irish Sea.

His sister Mary lived in Co Louth and her grave can still be seen in Dundalk while a park outside the town of Knockbridge was named after her.

The late Tyrone writer Benedict Kiely summed up Burns’s enduring popularity when he said: “Burns became a popular folk author in Ulster, Catholic and Protestant, as he never was or could have been in any other part of Ireland.

“Burns was the best of us.”

Tips for Burns Night

The following is recommended for celebrating Burns Night:

- Reciting of the Selkirk Grace:

Some hae meat and canna eat,

And some wad eat that want it;

But we hae meat, and we can eat,

Sae let the Lord be thankit.

- Entrance of the haggis.

Diners stand and slow-clap as a piper leads the haggis carried by the chef.

- The host then recites the eight-verse Address to a Haggis. Upon reaching the line “An’ cut you up wi’ ready sleight”, the host stabs the haggis with a sharp knife.

Guests applaud and toast the haggis with a glass of whisky.

- A typical menu would be:

cock-a-leekie soup,

haggis warm reeking, rich wi’ champit tatties,

bashed neeps (haggis with mashed potatoes and turnips with onion gravy), tyspy laird (sherry trifle), a tassie o’ coffee.

- A speech about Robert Burns.

- Toast to the lassies – originally a thank you to the ladies for preparing the food, with a bit of humour, and then a response from the lassies.

- Poems and songs performed by guests.

- The evening should end with guests standing, linking hands and singing Auld Lang Syne.

Burns anniversary celebrations

2009-01-12T13:47:00.002Z

2009 sees the 250^th anniversary of the birth of Robert Burns – Scotland’s national bard. To commemorate this cultural milestone, the Ulster-Scots Community Network (in partnership with Belfast City Council, the Arts Council for Northern Ireland and the Ulster-Scots Agency) will mark the anniversary with a series of events across Belfast to celebrate the life and legacy of Burns whilst highlighting the ever present links between Scotland and Ulster.

Writing in 1796 (the year of Burns’ death) the French Royalist émigré De Latocnaye writing about his travels through Ireland commented that –

“Belfast has almost entirely the look of a Scotch town, and the character of its inhabitants has considerable resemblance to that of the people of Glasgow. The way of speaking and even of dressing is much more Scotch than Irish.”

Robert Burns’ first volume of poems known as the Kilmarnock edition was published in July 1786 and extracts from it appeared in the Belfast Newsletter just three months later and his writings were a regular feature thereafter.

The first edition of Burns’s work published outside Scotland was produced in Belfast in 1787 and found its way into many Ulster homes. The language of Burns was the language of Ulster. Indeed, the writer and broadcaster Sam Hanna Bell reflected on the copy of Burns’s work found in the small farmhouse he occupied –

“….the only pages of the poet unthumbed were the glossary”

Andrew Gibson, a native of Ayrshire, Governor of the Linenhall Library and a President of the Belfast Scottish Association, assembled one of the world’s best collections of Burns literature. The Gibson collection, totalling over 2000 volumes, was purchased by public subscription in 1901 and placed in the Linenhall Library.

Burns’ granddaughter, Eliza Everitt, lived in Belfast and following her death her family further augmented the Linenhall collection by donating additional materials which had been in her possession.

The legacy of Burns and the cultural traditions associated with the Ulster-Scots people are an integral part of the cultural fabric of Northern Ireland and as such must be recognised and celebrated.

The “Belfast – Burns 250” programme will appeal to all sections of society and the wide range of events will have something to suit all tastes.

Poetry, Dance, Drama, Live Music, Cookery and Educational events at a variety of venues will combine to provide a unique opportunity for celebration throughout our capital city.

Some highlights include –

Thurs 24^th Jan

7.00 -8.30pm Connswater Centre – Cookery Demonstration, Bright Lights Dancers & Gilnahirk Pipe Band

6.30 -8pm Burns Supper and Entertainment – Shankill Library

9.00 -11.30pm Live Ulster-Scots music featuring “Stonewall” – Bob Stewart’s Pub, Drumbeg

Friday 23^rd Jan

11.00am – 12.30pm Schools Workshop Event with Ulster-Scots Folk Orchestra – Spectrum Centre

8.00pm -12.00am Live Music and Scottish Dancing– West Belfast Orange Hall

Saturday 24^thJan

10.30 -11.30am Ballycoan Pipe Band – Live performance at the Victoria Square Centre

11.00 -1.00pm Ulster-Scots cookery demonstration. St George’s Market.

Further details are available by contacting the Ulster-Scots Community Network on 028 90 436710.

Event

2008-09-25T15:54:00.005Z

NORTHERN LIGHT REVIEW

Francis Hutcheson Society

With the support of THE ULSTER-SCOTS AGENCY

Invite you to attend a symposium on Francis Hutcheson – ‘the Man from Drumalig’, Co Down

Francis Hutcheson was one of the foremost philosophers and thinkers of the 18^th century; read and studied throughout Europe and the American Colonies. He was the man who taught Adam Smith Economics and Moral Philosophy, was a major influence on David Hume in Scotland and Immanuel Kant in Germany and is often credited with being the father of the Scottish Enlightenment, although an Ulsterman. His politics and philosophy helped to shape the birth of modern Britain , America , Ireland and the Commonwealth yet today he is almost forgotten in his native land.

This symposium aims to alter this neglect and to help re-establish the importance of this great man by bringing together some of the top scholars in the area to present an overview of his background and key ideas and to examine how they are still relevant to the modern world and Ulster and Ireland in particular.

We thus invite you to attend this symposium as a major event on the road to re-establishing Francis Hutcheson and his ideas as major influences on the Enlightenment, the course of American, British and Irish history and that had a profound impact on the shaping of the modern world.

The symposium will take place in the Long Room, Parliament Buildings Stormont, Belfast on Saturday, 1^st November, 2008 , 9-30 am for 10 am , by the kind invitation of Mr Alan MacFarland, MLA, Mrs Carmel Hanna, MLA and Mr Trevor Lunn, MLA. The day will include morning and afternoon tea and coffee and lunch. In addition to the speakers there will be question and answer sessions and a concluding general panel and discussion arena open to the floor for contributions.

Email address!

2008-09-25T15:54:00.004Z

We have been having problems with our society email address (ulster-scots@qub.ac.uk)

Whilst we are trying to fix the problem please email ulster-society@qub.ac.uk

Many thanks

New Chairman takes the reins

2008-05-02T19:56:00.005Z

Andrew Charles, former Chair of the Queen's Ulster Society has been elected to the Chair of the Queen's Ulster-Scots Society. Andrew is a postgraduate student and Queen's graduate of Politics and Social Policy (2006). He has a keen interest in Ulster culture and society.

After what has been a dormant year for the society the new Chairman hopes to breathe new life into the association at Queen's reinvigorating the Ulster-Scots culture within the University.

If you are interested in joining or getting involved in any way please feel free to drop him an e-mail: ulster-society@qub.ac.uk

Annual St. Patricks Lecture

2008-03-01T00:10:00.001Z

The Queen's University Ulster Society Annual St. Patricks Day Lecture is scheduled to be held in the

Peter Froggatt Centre
Lecture theatre G07

At 8PM

On Wednesday 12th March 2008.

This is an open invitation. Everyone is welcome.

StPatricksLecture.pdf

New Concert DVD Available

2007-07-11T00:10:00.000Z

The DVD of our very successful Ulster-Scots concert is now available. The about video represents only a clip of the DVD and some of the content. The DVD is priced at £15 and can be ordered via our society e-mail address.

ulster-scots@qub.ac.uk

Our Submission to the Irish Language Bill Consultation

2007-06-01T10:20:00.000Z

Margaret O'Keeffe
Irish Language Bill Team
Department of Culture, Arts & Leisure
3rd Floor Interpoint
20-24 York Street
Belfast
BT15 1AQ
Margaret.OKeeffe@dcalni.gov.uk

Friday, 01 June 2007

Dear Margaret O'Keeffe,

Re: Irish Language Bill Consultation

It is the view of the signatories to this submission that the Irish Language Bill, in its current form would be detrimental to community relations within Northern Ireland and would in all likelihood undermine the very objectives which are considered the stated aim for the legislation.

The Irish language must always within the Northern Ireland context (and taking into account the “Shared Future” principles) be associated with the Ulster-Scots language. The true basis for equality must lie between those two languages, and that parity of esteem must be maintained otherwise which ever language is preferred will be perceived negatively by most of the other community, and indeed will be avoided by its own natural speakers to avoid causing offence (detrimental to very reason for the bill).

Ulster-Scots indeed has as strong a claim, if not stronger, to be the cultural language of Northern Ireland. The idea of equal treatment, between it and Irish however, is generally accepted, if not introduced in practice, by the government were spending appears to massively favour Irish.

If we are to move forward into a model shown in Scotland and in Wales, we must be certain to de-politicise the languages, the only way this can be down is to ensure that BOTH are included in a combined legislative programme that ensures absolute parity between them.

Within the Students’ Union at The Queen’s University of Belfast, there was at one time a Bi-Lingual signage policy for Irish and English signage. It was later recommended by the Fair Employment Commission that that signage be removed as it was recognised at causing a “chill factor” within the student body and alienating students from the protestant community. This was avoided by removing the bi-language signs. As QUB is an English speaking and learning university this had no effect on the use of the language or the facilities available to students, but the controversy could have as easily been avoided by the use of trilingual signs (English, Irish and Ulster-Scots).

It is this failure of parity between Irish and Ulster-Scots which will ultimately ensure that this legislation as it currently stands will undermine the Irish language and its usage and significantly detriment community relations. De-politicization, through absolute parity and the introduction of policy through need and adequate consultation, free from political bias is the only way forward, and the only way that minority language legislation will be acceptable to all members of the community of Northern Ireland.

Yours truly and on behalf of the Queen’s Ulster-Scots Society,

Edward Hanna
Convener 06/07

New Society Chairman Elected

2007-05-10T23:50:00.001Z

Edward Hanna has just beened elected to serve as chairman of the Queen's Ulster-Scots! He will be building on his successes as acting convenor during the concert in the students' union and the hard work and successes of the society over the 2006/7 year and Edward is also working with the Ulster-Scots Agency in there Summer Schools programme, and will bringing a new energy to the Society! Congratulations to him, and watch these space!

Ulster-Scots Concert a Great Success!

2007-04-01T19:33:00.000Z

Dominic Doherty, Students' Union Deputy General Manager and Edward Hanna, Student Community Action Officer, celebrate the success of the event.

FREE Ulster-Scots Concert Line-Up

2007-03-24T23:00:00.000Z

Mourne Young Defenders Flute Band

Upper Crossgare Pipe Band

Beggars Row

Ticket Details Available HERE

Ulster-Scots Concert Information

2007-03-16T20:30:00.000Z

Student Community Action in conjunction with Queen's Ulster-Scots presents an evening of Ulster-Scots Culture.

Mandela Hall
Queens University Students Union
Tuesday 27th March 8pm- Late
Tickets Free
Please R.S.V.P. to su.sca@qub.ac.uk or 02890971050

Tickets can be got from Students Union foyer or by contacting Edward on 02890971050

Other details:

Union Website
News Item on Website
Poster

Ulster-Scots Formal 2007

2007-03-08T16:33:00.000Z

Ulster-Scots Formal Dinner and Dance
Thursday 22nd March
Presented Haggis and Dance Callers
Ents: Gareth Fulton and His Band of Rogues + After Formal
Holiday Inn Hotel, Ormeau Avenue
Dinner + Dance £25, Dance Only £10
For Ticket orders:-

availability: next week check website for dates and times

or e-mail: ulster-society@qub.ac.uk

FREE Ulster-Scots Concert

2007-03-08T11:56:00.000Z

The Lyttle Family Folk Group
Upper Crossgare Pipe Band
Mourne Young Defenders Flute Band
Tuesday 27th March

FREE Ulster-Scots Showcase Concert
Mandela Hall, Students' Union, Queens, 8PM

Entrance by Ticket only, Available from Front Reception, Students Union

Oraganised by

The Ulster-Scots Agency

In association with

The Queen's Ulster-Scots Society

The Queen's Ulster Society

QUB SU Cultural Affairs Committee

Student Community Action

Ulster-Scots Showcase Events

2007-03-08T11:48:00.000Z

Ulster-Scots Agency
presents

In association with
Ulster-Scots Society
Student Community Action
and The Ulster Society

An Ulster-Scots Showcase event at Queen's

Lecture

Thursday 15th March, 6PM – 7PM
Ulster Society Annual Invitation Lecture
“The Authentic St. Patrick”
Gordon Lucy, The Ulster Society
Elmwood Centre (Behind Union) Lecture Theatre

Formal

Thursday 22nd March
Ulster-Scots Formal Dinner and Dance
Presented Haggis and Dance Callers
Ents: Gareth Fulton and His Band of Rogues + After Formal
Holiday Inn Hotel, Ormeau Avenue
Dinner + Dance £25, Dance Only £10
For Ticket availability see website (www.ulstersociety.com).

Concert

Ulster-Scots Concert

The Lyttle Family Folk Group
Upper Crossgare Pipe Band
Mourne Young Defenders Flute Band

Mandela Hall, Students Union – 9PM
Tickets Available from Front Reception, Students Union, Price: Free!

Tuesday 27th March
Ulster-Scots Information Day
Foyer, Students Union – All Day

Links

2007-03-02T21:38:00.003Z

National Ulster-Scots

University Sites
Queen's University of Belfast
QUB Student's Union

University Clubs and Societies
The Queen's Ulster Society
The Queen's Orange Society
Clubs and Societies Page

Academic Ulster-Scots Links
Stranmillis Ulster-Scots Projects
Institute of Ulster-Scots Studies (University of Ulster)

Other Ulster-Scots Links
Ulster-Scots Dance Alliance
Ulster-Scots Heritage Council
BBC Ulster-Scots Homepage

Our Friends
Drum Sounds - Flute Band Specialists
HeWhoHuntsBooks.com

Ulster-Scots Festival at Queen's

2007-02-28T00:33:00.000Z

Thursday 22nd February
Ulster-Scots Social
Snack Bar, Students Union – 8PM – 12PM
Tickets available from Reception on the night.

Thursday 15th March
Ulster Society Annual Invitation Lecture
“The Real St. Patrick”
Gordon Lucy, The Ulster Society
Elmwood Centre (Behind Union) LT ELCT – 6PM – 7PM

Wednesday 21st March
Rededication of the Students Union

Thursday 22nd March
Ulster-Scots Formal Dinner and Dance
Holiday Inn Hotel, Ormeau Avenue – 7:30 PM – 1AM
Tickets available at social, and other times available on website.

Friday 23rd March
RAG (Raising and Giving) Day
Everybody Off – Campus Wide

Tuesday 27th March
Ulster-Scots Information Day
Foyer, Students Union – All Day
Ulster-Scots Concert
Mandela Hall, Students Union – 9PM
Tickets Available from Front Reception, Students Union
Festival Lecture
“The Ancient Cruthlin peoples of Ulster”
Dr. Ian Adamson, Ulster-Scots Agency
Venue tbc, visit website for details.

About the Queen's Ulster-Scots

2007-01-22T13:43:00.000Z

The Queen's Ulster-Scots Society: raising the banner of awareness of Ulster-Scots culture, language and heritage in the premier academic institution of the province. Constituted by Authority of the Students' Representitive Council of the Students' Union of the Queen's University of Belfast.

Join the Ulster-Scots

2007-01-22T13:39:00.000Z

To join the Queen's Ulster-Scots Society, simply send us an e-mail and we'll get back to you with arrangements, or come to the freshers fair at the beginning of each academic year in the students' union.

The current membership is open to all students, staff and alumni of Queen's. The student's rate is £3 anually, and for others the rate is £10 annually.

E-mail: ulster-scots@qub.ac.uk