Clothes make the Irish : Irish dressing and the question of identity

When the Ladies' Committee of the Irish Clothing Committee (of the Society of Friends) launched An Appeal for Clothing the Naked and Destitute Irish in 1847 they probably did what's worst: they meant well. By trying to help the inhabitants of a famine-ridden Ireland, 'the poor perishing, half-clad, and in some cases, naked Irish', they confirmed a stereotype that had slowly evolved during the foregoing centuries: the Irish stand closer to the naked and uncultivated beast than to a well-dressed and civilized human (i.e. English). To help cultivate the Irish they have to be helped into proper clothing, even if these are only second-hand English garments. However, soon after half the nation had been dressed in 'stout flannel jackets' and 'flannel petticoats' [1] that these well-meaning English ladies had collected, this logic was to be turned around in the spirit of the Irish Renaissance. In 1886 a pamphlet was published on How to Dress in Irish Materials [2]. The Irish, wrongly civilised (Anglicised), were to be dressed in an Irish dress to be Irish (again). But why have the Irish to be dressed Irish to be Irish? And what is an Irish dress, and where had it gone?