Irish rEUnification? Post-Brexit futures of nostalgia and nostophobia among the Irish diaspora

Political ruptures such as Brexit open spaces for hopeful projections among stakeholder social groups and revive past political projects. This article uses an innovative photo-elicitation survey to analyse how members of the Irish diaspora in Britain engage with the emerging discourse of a reunited Ireland. This research population was chosen due to their relative marginalisation in these debates. The article used thematic analysis of their responses according to future hopes and fears using the concepts of nostalgia and nostophobia. The findings demonstrate that most participants deploy seemingly nostalgic conceptions of Irish reunification as an analogue to returned membership in more cosmopolitan bodies such as the European Union. However, responses differed over how likely Brexit will lead to reignited sectarianism. These fears crystalised over whether young people would be recruited and how past reminders of the conflict should be managed. The article demonstrates that even in a relatively uniform research population, there are lingering debates about constructions of the past and what role, if any, it should play in the future of post-conflict societies.