Immigration and Integration

“. . . broad-ranging and authoritative monograph . . . a very important addition to studies of the Irish in Britain. In its range and scholarship there is much to commend.” –Immigrants & Minorities

 “. . . [a] well researched study . . . most welcome . . . a refreshing addition to our understanding of the complexity of Welsh politics.” –Albion

“There are many local and regional (though few national) studies of the Irish in Britain and this is the best of them all. Paul O’Leary has produced a well-written, closely argued and extremely deeply researched book about one of the least studied Irish communities. The Irish in Wales is a revisionist study. It seeks to question the image, often portrayed, that the Irish in Britain were simply an out-group, despised by the host population, and rarely studied unless they were fighting someone on St. Patrick’s night. O’Leary’s is the clearest statement yet of the nuanced and multifarious image of Irishness and migration which most scholars favour.” –Social History Society

“This scholarly analysis of the fate of the Irish immigrants who came to this country mainly during the nineteenth century, is also an invaluable contribution to the history of Wales and the Welsh.” –New Welsh Review

 “ . . . this well-written book represents a valuable addition both to the social and religious history of Victorian Wales and the wider study of the Irish in Britain.” –English Historical Review

 “This is a work at the cutting edge of scholarship but it is written with a grace and fluency which is not always associated with books derived from PhD theses. One of its strongest features is the way in which meticulous examination of the internal history of Wales is combined with a clear sense of the world beyond Wales. It is clearly part of the "new British history" which takes as its subject "the totality of relationships in these islands". Throughout the book the distinctive experience of women in the migration is given full attention. Clearly this is a work which anyone with a claim to know about modern Wales must read and it shows that younger scholars are adapting to a new agenda formed by issues such as ethnicity and gender.” –Planet

 “This is a well-written, carefully analysed and perceptive study of the experiences of the second largest group of immigrants into Wales.” –www.gwales.com