A statement by the Women’s History Association of Ireland (WHAI) on the announcement (24 February 2026) by Minister for Culture, Communications and Sport, Patrick O’Donovan T.D. for a proposal to host a permanent exhibition telling the stories of women in Ireland at a purpose-built property in Limerick, as a regional branch of the National Museum of Ireland

The idea for a permanent exhibition follows the recommendation of the recently published report (October 2025) of the Advisory Committee on Women’s Stories established in March 2024. We acknowledge the dedication and hard work of the committee and the chair in presenting this report after taking on board all the various viewpoints offered.

As a stakeholder group regarding the representation of women’s stories and women’s history within the context of national cultural institutions and national collections, the WHAI has been involved throughout the process led by the Advisory Committee. A member of the WHAI executive serves on the Advisory Committee. WHAI members responded to a survey on this subject and two WHAI representatives presented the survey findings to the Women’s Stories Advisory Committee in April 2024.

Our surveyed members largely felt that the women’s lives, experiences and voices, in all their diversity, have not been documented and recorded so far within our cultural institutions and that the underrepresentation of women’s lives, experiences, and voices had an impact on women’s lives and well-being.

It is significant that a decision has been made at government level to fund and support a museum to ‘enhance women’s stories and voices, in all their diversity’ and offer space for ‘potentially providing for advocacy, research, education and outreach.’ The WHAI will continue to watch this process carefully and stress the importance of our continued engagement with future planning. We also remain supportive of continued efforts to increase the inclusion of women’s stories in other branches of our national museums.

As a national all-island association, promoting research and public engagement on the history of women in Ireland for four decades, the WHAI is an essential stakeholder in any future developments on the foundation of a women’s history museum in Ireland. We represent scholars and professional historians at all stages of their career working on Irish history throughout the ages and can therefore provide advice, guidance and expertise for this important institution.

WHAI AGM AND ANNUAL CHRISTMAS EVENT 6 December 2025

We had a really great catch up yesterday. Thanks again to Dr Melissa Shiel’s for a fascinating talk on how Regency women dressed.

On behalf of the committee and all of the members of the WHAI we would like to thank Diana Urquhart for her support as president of the association over the past five-years. Congratulations too to Sonja Tiernan our new WHAI president.

our new WHAI president.

36th ANNUAL WHAI CONFERENCE MARY IMMACULATE COLLEGE 29-30 MAY 2026

We are delighted this afternoon to announced the CFP for the 36th annual WHAI conference 2026. The conference will be held at Mary I Limerick on 29 & 30 May 2026. Closing dates for submissions on the theme of ‘Gain’ is 31 Jan. 2026.

Please click on link for more details

https://sites.google.com/view/whai2026conference/home?authuser=0

WHAI CHRISTMAS EVENT AND AGM 2025

LINK TO REGISTER ON EVENTBRITE

MacCurtain/Cullen Essay Prize Winner 2025

We are delighted to announce that this year’s winner of the MacCurtain/Cullen Essay prize is Maeve Hagerty. As in other years, the judges were very impressed with the high quality of all the submissions entered for the prize. It reflects the high caliber of research currently being undertaken in Ireland.

Maeve Hagerty

Maeve Hagerty is in the first year of an MPhil in Modern British History at the University of Oxford where her dissertation focuses on magical curses and witchcraft in modern Irish folklore and society. Maeve graduated summa cum laude with a BA in History and Political Science from Tufts University in 2024. Her undergraduate Senior Thesis was awarded Highest Honors and a chapter of this Thesis won both the William A. Wilson and the Elli Köngäs-Maranda Student Paper Prizes from the American Folklore Society.

The 2025 WHAI Conference is almost at capacity. Please register this week if you intend to join us in Carlow.

The WHAI intends to create an online directory for its members to highlight their wide range of research specialisms and provide contact details that would allow members of the public to get in touch with them when seeking professional advice on matters related to gender and womens’ history. We are particularly keen to include those currently completing a PhD or at an early stage of their career and not affiliated to a university. 

If you would like to add your name to the directory or you want more information, please contact Martin Walsh at whaiwebofficer@gmail.com no later than 17 May at 5pm. Two lines of text will be sufficient. It should detail what stage of your career you are at, whether you are affiliated to a university or not, and your area(s) of expertise. The directory will be launched on 1 June 2025. We plan to update the directory again on 1 December 2025.

Extension of the Anna Parnell Travel Grant

New date for submission is 5 pm 28 February 2025

Please email us at womenshistoryassociation@gmail.com with any queries, and please email your submission to the Secretary at that address above by 5 pm 28 February 2025

Final Call WHAI Conference 2025

WHAI 2025 Conference Keynote Speaker Clair Wills

This year we are delighted to have as our Keynote Speaker Award Winning Author and Academic Prof Clair Wills. We are really looking forward to her Keynote address.

In our continued efforts to encourage, stimulate and promote the research of emerging scholars in the field of women’s and gender history, we’re delighted to announce our new ‘Emerging Scholars’ Blog Series’ which will spotlight the incredible work that is being conducted in the field.

We intend to publish blogs on our website and social media channels with the objective of giving new researchers the space to share their research and network digitally. We are conscious of the financial burdens of postgraduate research and therefore intend to award all WHAI published bloggers with a €100 stipend.

We are now accepting blog entries with the following criteria:

• 500-700 words.
• Blogs should not have been previously published in any format.
• Topics to include, but not limited to: current research, case-studies, methodologies, archive visits, conference participation, etc.
• Any relevant images of sources, archives, etc., to promote the visual aspect of your topic.
• ‘Emerging Scholars’ = any current MA/M.PHIL./PhD student or those who completed their PhD in the last three years.

The deadline has been extended until 31 October 2024. Please send your blog post and brief bio to: womenshistoryassociation@gmail.com

Just a quick update to note that the WHAI AGM for 2023 will take place on Thursday 7 December at 7pm on Zoom. All members are welcome. 

For our online winter gathering, we will follow the AGM at 7.30pm with a poetry reading by Julie Morrissey. Julie will talk about her practice of writing poetry based on Irish women’s history and will read a few of her poems. We are very much looking forward to this event! This is open to non-members as well as members. 

You can sign up for the event here to receive the Zoom link. 

Julie Morrissy was the first Poet-in-Residence at the National Library of Ireland from 2021-22. Her project Radical! Women and the Irish Revolution comprises a podcast series and pamphlet of poetry, photographs, maps, translation and research notes. Her awards include the National Endowment for the Humanities, the Newman Fellowship in Creativity, the MAKE Theatre Award, and the ‘Next Generation’ Award and Literature Bursary from the ArtsCouncil. Her poem-artworks have been exhibited at Project Arts Centre, Dublin, TULCA Festival of Visual Arts, and at the Museum of Literature Ireland (forthcoming Jan. 2024). Morrissy holds a PhD in Creative Writing from Ulster University, and separate degrees in Literature (Toronto Metropolitan University), and Law (University College Dublin). 

We are also planning a social gathering in Dublin on 6 January, details to follow.

We are delighted to announce that our 2024 conference will be held at Queen’s University Belfast on 26-27 April 2024. This year’s broad theme is ‘Irish women and relationships from medieval to modern history’. Abstracts of between 250-300 words and a short biography should be sent to whaiconference2024@gmail.com on or before 12 January 2024.

The deadline for our annual MacCurtain/Cullen Essay Prize in Irishwomen’s History has been extended to 31st March 2023.

The Women’s History Association of Ireland awards an annual MacCurtain/Cullen Prize in Irishwomen’s History in recognition of the outstanding contribution to Irish women’s history by Margaret MacCurtain and Mary Cullen. The prize is offered for the best original essay in the field of Irish women’s or gender history by a current or recent BA or MA/MPhil student.

Eligible candidates for the MacCurtain/Cullen Prize in Irishwomen’s History should be current or recent BA or MA/MPhil students. Original essays of 5-8,000 words (including footnotes) should be based on a dissertation or research essay in the area of Irish women’s or Irish gender history submitted to any university on the island of Ireland between 2017 and 2022. Submissions can deal with any chronological period, any historical subject relating to women/gender, any geographical location on the island of Ireland, and must be in English.

Please indicate in your accompanying email the degree programme to which the essay/ thesis was submitted. If you are submitting a thesis or dissertation extract, please provide a sentence explaining the place of the extract in the wider thesis, to aid the judging panel to contextualise the submitted work. Submissions should be submitted in word format and should not include the author’s name or other identifying information on the document itself.  Membership of the WHAI is a requirement for entry.

Please email us at womenshistoryassociation@gmail.com with any queries and please email your submission to the Secretary at that address by 31st March 2023.

We are delighted to announce that our 2023 conference will be held at University College Cork on 26-27 May 2023. This year’s broad theme is ‘Reform, Repeal, and Repression: Irish Women and the State’. Abstracts of between 250-300 words and a short bio should be sent to whaiconf23@gmail.com on or before Friday 27 January 2023.

Submissions for the 2022 Anna Parnell Travel Grant and MacCurtain/Cullen Essay Prize are now being accepted. 

The Anna Parnell Travel grant was established in 2011 to promote research among early stage scholars in Irishwomen’s and Gender History. Due to limitations placed on travel due to Covid-19, it has been decided to award three smaller grants this year. Grants of up to €170 will be available. These can be used to cover the costs of acquiring scanned/digitised copies of archival material or other online research costs as an alternative to travel costs

The MacCurtain/Cullen Prize in Irishwomen’s History is awarded annually in recognition of the outstanding contribution to Irish women’s history by Margaret MacCurtain and Mary Cullen. The prize is offered for the best original essay in the field of Irish women’s or gender history by a current or recent BA or MA/MPhil student.

Please see our Grants and Prizes page for more details.