Women of the Borderlands

Call for Participants

Women of the Borderlands: A Walking Biographical Study of Women’s Everyday Life on the UK/Irish Border 

This collaborative project led by Dr Theresa O’Keefe of University College Cork and Dr Niall Gilmartin at Ulster University, investigates women's relationship with the border on the island of Ireland. It is funded by the Higher Education Authority through its North-South Research Programme.

The research uses Walking as a Biographical Method or ‘walking interviews’ to explore how women's lives were shaped by living in communities along the UK/Irish border during the Troubles and since the signing of the Good Friday Agreement. The interviews are mobile and will see participants take the researcher on journeys that mimic their routine border crossings taken for work, to visit or care for family, for leisure, to run errands, or other ordinary journeys taken as part of everyday life. It endeavours to document the gendered impacts of border life and will publicly archive untold stories of how women navigated the border as part of everyday life.

We are currently seeking women to participate in these mobile interviews with one of us to help trace their typical journey across the border.