Exploring Cath Maige Tuired through the Concept of Hybridity

Abstract

This chapter examines the contemporary Irish identity and social reactions to the process of cultural hybridization, as they are depicted in the late Viking-Age narrative Cath Maige Tuired. The tale is a product of a transitional era whose preoccupations and prejudices are reflected in the narrative representations of the Fomoiri and the Tuatha Dé Danann. This chapter considers Cath Maige Tuired within its historical context as a narrative of hybridity in which the pivotal cultural identities are built on an ongoing comparison between the tale’s representations of the Self and the Other. At the same time the narrative illustrates a number of other cultural concerns at the forefront of the collective intellectual consciousness.