Conference Organisers
Mark Elliott & Stanislava Antonijević
Caitriona Martyn
Heike Schmidt
Brian Bargary
Paul Mulcahy
"Galway Hookers off Inishmore" by Ian Maginnis.

 

Schedule

Schedule Information is now available and will be updated - click on Schedule to the left.

 

Travel visas and letter of confirmation/invitation

Some people will require invitations for the purposes of reimbursement, leave to attend the meeting and, importantly to acquire a VISA to travel to Ireland.

The Republic of Ireland is a sovereign state and not a signatory to the Schengen Agreement. In fact, it is quite difficult to get a visa to travel to Ireland and if you need a visa YOU SHOULD START THE APPLICATION NOW. Prospective applicants should consult the web site of the Irish Naturalisation & Immigration Service for details (http://www.inis.gov.ie/). Note the clicking on the link to the left may be suspect, also and importantly, the information given on this site as to how to acquire a visa is correct but may differ from that given at local consular services. If so, point out what it says on the web site.

I will write letters of invitation next week if I am altered to this by people who require a visa. I will need to know names, nationality, place and date of birth, passport number, date and place of issue and the occupation of all people applying. That is you and your spouse of s/he is accompanying you and requires a visa. I will also extend invitations to spouses of nationals not requiring a visa. Don't forget to send addresses to which I can send the invitations by post.

I will also send your details to contacts within the Irish government and this will serve as a form of guarantee which may expedite and ensure visa issue. In fact In have already made them aware of the meeting because there are people registering speculatively and possibly for the purpose of visa acquisition. The visa process can be lengthy so please make sure you furnish me - and I can furnish them - with details now.

Please note that the completed registration form does not itself qualify you for a visa to travel to the Republic of Ireland while spurious or seemingly opportunistic registrations may be referred to the Departent of Justice in Dublin.

 

Proceedings

The deadline remains August 15th - we can be slightly flexible but in order to have a book we need to get it to the printers by early September, which means we have to scan 70 - 80 papers etc beforehand. Consequently, if you are later than about a week, so 22.08, time may have overtaken and the process moved on a step. Please aim to have papers to us on time as these are very valuable records of the meeting.

As regards people not attending and wanting proceedings the situation is this. It would cost about €10 to post - and we can send copies by post if someone does not collect. We have money for 120 copies from the Social Sciences Research Centre at NUI Galway and your copies are essentially free, and we can handle, free of charge, yours and other requests for copies to a maximum of 120 copies (postal charges still applying). After that we would have to levy an additional charge. The rule here is first come first served, excepting registered meeting attendees for whom a copy will be provided.

You may have guessed that, unlike the Leipzig meeting, we do not (yet!) have 120 people coming.

 

Travel to Galway

Is not without its problems. Galway (GWY) has an airport, served by AerArran flights from Dublin (DUB) and London Luton (LTN) (http://www.aerarran.com/), as well as several other UK airports. It is about €20 to take a taxi from the airport to any of the hotels in or close to the city. But you CANNOT book straight through (and don't believe it if they say you can) if you wish to connect in Dublin or Luton with an aerarran flight. You will have to collect your bags, leave the arrivals hall and book in again - this would have impact if there was a short period between flights or if you needed a UK transit visa.

Shannon (SNN) takes a connecting flight from London Heathrow (LHR) via aerlingus (http://www.aerlingus.com/) who fly two or three times a day, and you can check straight through. However, after about 7:50 pm it is impossible to leave the airport except by taxi (unless someone gives you a ride). Before then there are City Link (http://www.citylink.ie/) and bus Eireann (http://www.buseireann.ie/) At that time of day there is, I believe (and Irish recipients of this email please prove me wrong) no public transport from Limerick, the nearest city and Galway. There are various low cost flights with Ryanair (http://www.ryanair.com/) into Shannon but many arrive late.

Dublin connects to Galway by air (aerarran) and bus (Bus Eireann, City Link, Gobus (http://www.gobus.ie/), it also connect fairly well with the rest of the world.

 

This conference is supported by the Social Sciences Research Council, and by the Conferences Fund, of the National University of Ireland, Galway.