Dublin’s Liberties in Post-Crash Gentrification (2015-18) is a community-based ethnographic project led by urban researcher Dr Lidia Katia C. Manzo (grant holder) and supervised by urban political geographer Dr Sinead Kelly. The project is hosted at the Geography Department of Maynooth University and funded by the Irish Research Council (IRC) Postdoctoral Fellowship scheme (grant number GOIPD/2015/518).
#FreeLibertiesDublin
Aims of the research
This research examines how the Liberties area of Dublin – subjected to various waves of gentrification since the early 1990s – is facing profound and dynamic social, economic and cultural transformation, with a focus on housing displacement and other pressures experienced by existing working-class households. It also discusses different ways to engage with the communities under study, aiming for reflexive, contextual, and critical understanding of the use of ethnographic field work and visual methods as a platform for participatory collaborations between urban communities, researchers, and policy makers to develop synergistic research and social change agendas. The expected impact of this project, in fact, is dedicated to democratizing urban research, by rendering methods and results transparent and usable for making local knowledge explicit.
Read the research information sheet
Publications and Outcomes
Community Asset-Building for Gentrification Pressure Alleviation in Disadvantaged Areas. The case of Dublin’s Liberties, working paper co-authored with Sinéad Kelly. Presented at the Conference of Irish Geographers (CIG) 2017 Annual Meeting, session ‘Lived spaces of austerity: encounters and experiences in everyday life’ – Cork (Ireland), May 2017.
Lived experiences of resistance and solidarity among working-class communities in Dublin’s post-crash gentrification, working paper co-authored with Sinéad Kelly. Presented at the American Association of Geographers (AAG) 2017 Annual Meeting, session ‘Crisis-modes: logics, practices and re-articulations’ – Boston (USA), April 2017.
Gentrification ‘Suspended’? Variegated effects of actually existing neoliberalism in the aftermath of Dublin’s crisis, working paper co-authored with Sinéad Kelly. Presented at EURA Conference ‘City lights: Cities and citizens within, beyond, notwithstanding the crisis’ – Turin (Italy), June 2016.
Supported by
The Society of St. Vincent de Paul, Meath Street charity shop
The Robert Emmet Community Development Project, Usher Street
Liberties Breakfast & After school club, Francis Street
Guild Of The Little Flower (Penny Dinners), Meath Street
Latest from the Blog:
Opening Night – 80 Years Of Oliver Bond Flat Complex in Dublin’s Liberties – September 6, 2016
Working together, to build community – July 14, 2016
On the Back-Stage of Gentrification – July 5, 2016
The Legacy of Heritge in the community of Oliver Bond flats – November 11, 2016
The Liberties, November 2015 © LKCM
Francis Street, January 2016 © LKCM
Meath street in the 1970s, Larkin butcher on the corner
Meath Street, March 2016 © LKCM
Usher Street, June 2016 © LKCM
Dublin map, 1610
Oliver Bond, Summer 2016 © LKCM
Meath Street market, May 2016 © LKCM
The women meeting at Robert Emmet community center, June 2016 © LKCM
Lidia K.C. Manzo 