The Use of Visibility in Contentious Events in Northern Ireland

Abstract

Territorial space in Northern Ireland is often associated with certain communal and political identities. This is vividly demonstrated by traditional parades in local areas. Some parades become contentious because they pass through localities associated with very different communities. Often, contentious parades are met with protests, which can become violent. Based on ethnographic fieldwork on the contentious Protestant Orange Order parade through Ardoyne in North Belfast, we interpret contentious events not just in the usual terms of territorial struggles but as a quest for visibility. A focus on visibility as a field of social action, through which territories are established and contested, illuminates better the social relationships at work and the effects of their contestation at their nexus.