A couple of weeks ago, I was on vacation with my family in Ireland. During the last few days, we stayed at a hotel right on the River Liffey, and near us was a series of bronze statues by Rowan Gillespie called Famine. The statues are stark, melted figures—reminiscent of Munch’s The Scream—depicting Irish refugees of the Great Famine departing for American shores in the mid-1800’s. Gillespie unveiled the statues in 1997, and shortly after in 1998, the City of Boston, which is the closest metro to me, commissioned Robert Shure for a similar work, memorializing the arrival of those same refugees.
I don’t have any Irish ancestors to speak of, although if you ask my dad, we’re more Irish than James Joyce. He took a 23andMe test years ago that, according to him, says he’s over half Irish. I’ve always had my doubts about this, given that 23andMe seems to lump British and Irish results together without much distinction. And unfortunately for Dad, his son is prone to hyperfixation. So I spent the better part of an evening building my family tree, to see if any Irish immigrants were, in fact, sitting in its branches.
Turns out, most of my Dad’s side of the family has been American for a long time. I found long lines of New York agrarians and Tennessee hillbillies. He did have great-grandparents who emigrated to New York from a town called Wookey Hole in Somerset, England, which sent me on a tangent learning about the fabled witch who once lived in its caves. (Years ago I learned that I’m a descendant of Rebecca Nurse, the last woman to be convicted in the Salem witch trials. There’s a theme in this family, apparently.)
Lots of fascinating leaves in the tree. But no Irish progenitors to be found.
My Dad’s belief in his Irish heritage is shared by over 30 million Americans. In a place like Boston, with its long history of Irish immigration, it’s likely true for many people. But I doubt it’s true for everyone. It gets me thinking about why so many Americans are obsessed with finding an Irish connection. Culturally, I get it. The art, the music, the libations—so much Irish culture is interwoven into American life, especially in the Northeast, that it’s not surprising people want to imagine it’s their birthright. But there’s nothing wrong with just enjoying—even participating in—a culture without being native to it, and I’ve yet to meet a bona fide Irish American who didn’t want to freely share it. I think it’s something else that makes us white Americans long for Irish heritage. And I think it has much to do with guilt.
When my dad first mentioned his DNA results, I asked his mom about it. His dad’s lineage is demonstrably English, so she would be the most likely conduit for any Celtic roots. She wasn’t certain, vaguely mentioning a family acquaintance who might have visited from Ireland when she was a young girl in the 30’s. But she did remember distinctly the signs reading “No Irish Need Apply” in the windows of shops that were hiring in her Midwestern town, and how sad it made her that people would treat the influx of immigrants that way.
“No Irish Need Apply” is mentioned on Shure’s memorial as a phrase that appeared frequently in Boston, a town that now embraces its Irish heritage with fervent pride, despite its initial hostility. I think this is instructive of why so many Americans want to claim Irish heritage, even if they can’t prove it. None of us want to think of ourselves as descending from the oppressor. It brings with it a specter of guilt we either feel is undue or don’t know how to reconcile. Rather than grapple with it, I think a lot of us would rather rewrite the narrative to claim we were part of the oppressed, especially if we can do so under the cover of a vague ancestry test.
To be fair, I don’t think was my dad’s motivation. As someone who lived abroad most of his young life, I think he just has an abiding love of immigrants in general. I think a lot of natural-born Americans crave the inherent dignity of being an immigrant. To immigrate to America is to pursue a radical faith in merit—the belief that under the stars and stripes, one’s hard work can reap the reward it deserves. Maybe that’s why so many natural-born Americans also resent them: often the superior patriotism and work ethic of the immigrant undermines their claim that their blessings due to merit, not inheritance.
We don’t have to reach for non-existent ancestry, Irish or otherwise, to honor the dignity of immigration. We can do it—we must do it—now by demanding it from our legislators, especially as the administration seeks to demonize and persecute them. The signs no longer read “No Irish Need Apply.” They read “Mass Deportations Now,” and they are being wielded with the same gleeful, banal cruelty as during the fallout of the Great Famine.
I don’t want to give mournful sculptors any more reasons to build statues. There’s one standing on Ellis Island now, torch in hand, welcoming the foreigner to our shores. For the near future, let her be the only one we need.
