Gerry Adams, president of Sinn Féin, the Irish national political party, will deliver the lecture, “Irish America and the Struggle for Freedom in Ireland,” at 8 p.m. on Tuesday, Sept. 25, at Burt Kahn Court on Quinnipiac
University’s Mount Carmel Campus. This event
is free and open to the public.
Adams’ lecture is part of Quinnipiac’s celebration of the opening of Ireland's Great Hunger Museum, Museam An Ghorta Mór, home to the world's largest collection of
visual art, artifacts and printed materials relating to the starvation and forced emigration that occurred throughout Ireland from 1845 to 1852. The museum, located at 3011 Whitney Avenue, near Quinnipiac’s Mount Carmel and York
Hill campuses, will open on Thursday, Oct. 11.
Adams was elected to the Irish Parliament in 2011 when he topped the poll with more than 15,000 votes. Also as president of Sinn Féin, Adams has played a leadership role in the peace process and in bringing about the extraordinary changes that have occurred in the last two decades. He also has been central to promoting Sinn Féin's plan for economic recovery.
Adams was born in 1948 on Belfast’s Falls Road in Northern Ireland. There were republican and labor politics in his family. It was this and his early life in Ballymurphy, which shaped his Republican politics. Adams joined Sinn Féin and became involved in the civil rights campaign in the North in the late 1960s. He was actively involved in campaigns around housing, equality and electoral rights.
In 1983, Adams was elected to represent the constituency of West Belfast at Westminster. As a member of Parliament representing West Belfast, Adams has played a central role in all of the major social and economic campaigns and initiatives in the constituency. A fluent Irish language
speaker, Adams is a Gaelic Athletic Association supporter who writes a bi-weekly blog for the Belfast Media Group. He has also published 13 books.
For more information about the lecture, call 203-582-8652.
Quinnipiac is a private, coeducational, nonsectarian institution located 90 minutes north of New York City and two hours from Boston. The university enrolls 6,200 full-time undergraduate and 2,300 graduate students in
58 undergraduate and more than 20 graduate programs of study in its School of Business and Engineering, School of Communications, School of Education, School of Health Sciences, School of Law, Frank H. Netter MD School of Medicine, School of Nursing and College of Arts and Sciences. Quinnipiac consistently ranks among the top regional universities in the North in U.S. News & World Report’s America’s Best Colleges issue. The 2013 issue of U.S. News & World Report’s America’s Best Colleges named Quinnipiac as the top up-and-coming school with master’s programs in the Northern Region. Quinnipiac also is recognized in Princeton Review’s “The Best 377 Colleges.” For more information, please visit www.quinnipiac.edu. Connect with Quinnipiac
on Facebook at www.facebook.com/quinnipiacuniversity and follow Quinnipiac on Twitter @QuinnipiacU.
