Irish Literary Studies in the Age of the Digital Platform

The last decade has seen the publication of many large-scale, multi-authored essay collections related to the study of literature and culture by major academic presses such as Routledge, Cambridge University Press, and Oxford University Press. This unprecedented wave of multi-author histories, companions, handbooks, and overviews has become a notable yet largely unexamined phenomenon in Irish studies. This article attempts to describe and understand the growth of this specific media for literary criticism and scholarship by attending to some of the economic conditions shaping its production, mediation, and consumption. This is a form of publishing seemingly shaped not so much by any intellectual developments as by the nature of the contemporary marketplace within academic publishing. A key aspect of this marketplace is the move towards publishing via digital platforms. This article explores how such technological and economic imperatives are determining the content of the field of literary criticism and scholarship on Irish writing.