Acknowledgements Preface A 'Habitable Grief'?: The Legacy of Cultural and Political Strife in Ireland's Contentious Language Systems A Republic of One: Individuality, Autonomy and the Question of Irish Collectivity in Seamus Deane's Reading in the Dark and Dermot Healy's A Goat's Song Writing Republicanism: A Betrayal of Entrenched Tribalism in Belfast's Own Vernacular  The Misfit Chorus Line: Ireland from the Margins in Patrick McCabe's Call Me the Breeze Casting Cathleen: Femininity and Motherhood on the Contemporary Irish Stage Works Cited Bibliography Index

Ireland's history of contested language systems has always been linked to its political realities; Language, Identity and Liberation attends to a movement of contemporary Irish writing that considers the significance of the region's tumultuous cultural, social and political history in portrayals of contemporary Ireland's everyday life and speech.

JENNIFER KEATING-MILLER was born in Cobh, Co. Cork, Ireland but moved to California in 1988. She studied English and History at the University of Rochester, USA, graduating Magna cum Laude with Highest Distinction and Research Honors. She earned a Doctorate in English at the University of Pittsburgh in 2009. She will begin to work at Carnegie Mellon University in June 2009.