Our Team
Dr Ailbhe McDaid
Principal Investigator
Ailbhe McDaid is Lecturer in English at Mary Immaculate College, University of Limerick and Principal Investigator on the Research Ireland-funded Pathways Fellowship Pathologies of Violence: Inscriptions of Global Conflict in Irish Literature 1922-present (PATHOS). She has published widely on twentieth and twenty-first century literature, on themes of migration, conflict, displacement, gender and biopolitics. Her first book The Poetics of Migration in Contemporary Irish Poetry was published by Palgrave Macmillan in 2017; her second monograph Literature and the Irish Revolution: Reactions, Reflections, Reinventions is forthcoming from Routledge in 2026. Her work has been funded by Royal Irish Academy, British Academy, Irish Research Council Postdoctoral Fellowship, Irish Research Council New Foundations Award and Enterprise Ireland.
Dr Julie Morrissy
Postdoctoral Researcher
Julie Morrissy is a poet, academic, and critic. From 2021-2022, she was the first Poet-in-Residence at the National Library of Ireland. Her publication Radical! Women and the Irish Revolution is archived at the National Library of Ireland, along with her papers. Morrissy’s awards include creative writing fellowships from the Fulbright Commission, the National Endowment of the Humanities, and the John Pollard Newman Foundation, as well as the Next Generation Artist Award and a Literature Bursary from the Arts Council of Ireland. She has held postdoctoral appointments at the University of Notre Dame, Maynooth University, and University College Dublin. Morrissy holds a PhD in Creative Writing from Ulster University, and separate degrees in Literature, and Law.
Leah Smith
PhD Researcher
Leah Smith completed her undergraduate degree in English, Geography and Creative writing at the University of Galway. Continuing her studies with the University of Galway, she earned a master's degree in Literature and Publishing in November 2024. As part of her work on the PATHOS Project, she will explore ideas of “elsewhere” and migration in Irish literary periodicals.