Biography: Elaine Farrell (Author) Elaine Farrell is a Reader in the School of History, Anthropology, Philosophy and Politics at Queen's University Belfast, and co-creator with Leanne McCormick of the Bad Bridget project. I was expecting some bias, as it was written by Irish authors, making the women out to be 'victims' of emigration, but it wasn't. Whereas they would have usually sat together in one space, improvising, discussing and composing the music in a face to face fashion, the restrictions and lockdowns meant that this working process had to be altered. From Boltzmann to quantum theory, from Einstein to loop quantum gravity, our understanding of time has been undergoing radical transformations.

Like it was so incomprehensible to some of the well-meaning aid societies why an immigrant woman in an abusive relationship living in squalor with more kids than she could handle would want to have a drink from time to time to forget reality! Also their podcast, Bad Bridget is brilliant so I would also definitely recommend giving that a listen. A decade before the true crime show Serial took the world by storm, creators were making some of the earliest shows. From sex workers and thieves to kidnappers and killers, these Bridgets are young women who have gone from the frying pan of their impoverished homeland to the fire of vast North American cities.Bad Bridget does an amazing job in taking many, sometimes clinical, sources of information and turning them into fascinating and thrilling stories of equally fascinating women. In November 2017 the people of Zimbabwe took to the streets in an unprecedented alliance with the military. Often leaving Ireland in the grip of the famine or the decades following, deserted or abused by husbands, left to raise ever increasing number of children with no hope of help or respite.

By giving a voice to these Irish women history has neglected, Farrell and McCormick disrupt the romanticised narrative of Irish immigration to North America that is prominent in popular culture today.

He didn't know or didn't want to know her crime, admitting in his letter of 11 April 1892, "I know not the cause of her misfortune". They reveal the social forces that bred this mayhem and dysfunction, through a succession of stories that are brilliantly strange, sometimes very funny, and often deeply moving. Andrew McDowell came on board, we successfully applied for funding from the AHRC and after many meetings later here we are today! With that said, I fully appreciate the limitations of these stories where so little information is often available and the limitations of the written word as a medium for conveying this information that probably best lends itself to a more conversational format, so now that I’m properly initiated into the topic, I’m really looking forward to listening to Farrell and McCormick’s podcast of the same name! It’s so different from seeing it written on the page and being able to share it with such a wide audience is amazing.

Join Elaine Farrell, Leanne McCormick and guests as they discuss ‘Bad Bridgets’ and the untold stories of generations of Irish female immigrants to the USA that history chose to forget. Leanne McCormick is a Senior Lecturer in the School of Arts and Humanities at Ulster University and co-creator with Elaine Farrell of the Bad Bridget project. We consider women’s roles in the sale of sex, including as sex workers and brothel-keepers, and their lived realities.On International Women's Day, social media is flooded with snippets of inspiring and pioneering female role models from the past, companies highlight women's achievements in and outside the workplace, and the Gender Pay Gap bot exposes what its name suggests (usually indicating lower pay for women). From alcoholism, sex work, vagrancy, theft, kidnapping, infanticide, and murder, the picture of Irish women is not a good one. We chose the name as Bridget was both a really common name for Irish women in the nineteenth century but also Bridget or Biddy was the name term used to refer to Irish women who worked as servants in American homes- often in a derogatory way. Bad Bridget is a masterpiece of social history and true crime, showing us a fascinating and previously unexplored world. Wintering is a poignant and comforting meditation on the fallow periods of life, times when we must retreat to care for and repair ourselves.

There is a free postage option at checkout if you are housebound/shielding, on low income, or need help with postage costs for any other reason. Elaine Farrell and Leanne McCormick, in conversation with Kathy Clugston, talk about their bestselling book and tell the strange, funny, and often moving stories of these Bad Bridgets, young women who left their impoverished homeland and ended up as sex workers, thieves, kidnappers and killers. Among the wave of emigrants from Ireland to North America were many, many young women who travelled on their own, hoping for a better life. Now an award winning podcast and book, Leanne and Elaine join me in this episode share the stories they have uncovered. This 'back and forth' composing became a lot of fun, where the two women were eagerly waiting for each other’s musical ideas to which they could then respond in their own time and in their own homes (Franziska indeed recorded in her small but nicely resonant bathroom in Belfast!Traditionally, women’s stories have been underrepresented at the Ulster American Folk Park, even though women accounted for around half of Irish migrants from 1800 onwards.