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Sat 09 Sep 2009Lifting the lid on Irish sexuality
SOCIETY: IVANA BACIKreviews Occasions of Sin: Sex and Society in Modern Irelandby Diarmaid Ferriter
Profile Books, 694 pp. €30
ARE WE A uniquely sexually repressed nation? In this comprehensive work, Diarmaid Ferriter suggests our sexual history is “as complex and multi-layered as in many other countries”. His own research, from an impressive diversity of sources, unravels many of these layers. What emerges is the sense that, while there may have been little unique about Irish sexuality, the Irish State responded with laws that were uniquely submissive to the doctrines of the dominant church.
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