Stewart Parker, the UWC Strike of May 1974, and Prisons

This chapter explores the UWC strike of May 1974 through the prism of playwright Stewart Parker. A native of East Belfast, Parker experimented with the dramatic form at the same time as structuring his work around the politics, divisions, and contradictions of his own community. The strike led to the destruction of the Sunningdale power-sharing Executive, though this was as much an expression of working-class Protestant power as an assault on the concept of nationalists (and Catholics) in power. This connectedly takes in Loyalist prisoners who began swelling the jails, a familiar academic concentration but seldom addressed through a cultural prism. Martin Lynch’s Chronicles of Long Kesh (2009) tackles the experience via a contested portrayal of Loyalist prisoners. The chapter ends with a return to Stewart Parker’s capacious and self-critical take on Ulster Protestant identity.

Aesthetics · Art · Criminology · Identity (music) · Political science · Politics · Power (physics) · Prism · Protestantism · Sociology · History · Irish and British Studies · Law · Philosophy · Religious studies