Project Team

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Co-Principal Investigator: Prof. Claire Connolly

Prof. Claire Connolly, Deep Maps: West Cork Coastal CulturesClaire Connolly is Professor of Modern English in the College of Arts, Celtic Studies and Social Sciences (CACSSS) at University College Cork. Her research and teaching interests include Irish writing; the novel in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries; romanticism in Ireland, Scotland and Wales; Welsh-Irish cultural exchanges; and Ireland and cultural theory. Claire Connolly was formerly a professor at Cardiff University and also held the position of visiting professor in Irish Studies at Boston College (2002-3) and Concordia University, Montreal (Fall 2011). She is Vice Chair (Ireland) of the International Association for the Study of Irish Literature, and Co-Director of the Wales-Ireland Research Network.

Email: claireconnolly@ucc.ie

Co-Principal Investigator: Dr Rob McAllen

Dr Rob McAllen is a Senior Lecturer within the School of Biological, Earth and Environmental Sciences and is also research coordinator for the University College Cork labs at Lough Hyne Marine Nature Reserve in West Cork. He has been in Cork since 2002 with previous positions held at University of Aberdeen and University of York. He is a marine biologist with a number of different research areas including conservation, sustainability, public awareness and outreach, and animal adaptations to natural and anthropogenic disturbances. He is currently  an External Examiner for the Marine Biology degree at the University of Aberdeen in the UK (2013-2018) and was an external examiner for Coastal Marine Biology at the University of Hull prior to that (2009-2012). In addition, he is the Programme Director for the M.Sc in Marine Biology at University College Cork; a scientific advisor for the Partnership for Interdisciplinary Studies of Coastal Oceans (PISCO); and the European Science Foundation and a reviewer for the UK Natural Environment Research Council. Rob is heavily involved at School and College level in Academic Programmes and Curriculum Development being chair of both of these committees.

Email: r.mcallen@ucc.ie

Postdoctoral Researcher: Dr Rachel Murphy

Rachel holds a PhD in History and Digital Humanities from University College Cork. She is a graduate of the University of Oxford where she studied English Language and Literature, and of the University of Limerick where she conducted an MA in the History of Family. While working on her PhD she completed a  Higher Diploma in Geographical Information Systems at University College Cork. Her research interests include digital and spatial humanities, landed estates history, environmental history and local history. Rachel’s role on the project has been to develop the Deep Maps website and visualisations with Orla-Peach Power, and to conduct historical research and develop content for the website.

Research Assistant: Breda Moriarty

Breda MoriartyBreda is a full-time research assistant on the Deep Maps Project and works in the School of Biology, Earth and Environmental Science. She holds an M.Sc in Rural Development from University College Dublin. Previously, she worked in Banff National Park, Canada as a researcher studying grizzly bear mortality on railway tracks. She also has experience in volunteering on various ecological projects with Parks Canada Agency. Breda’s role on the project has been to design questionnaires and organise multiple stakeholder and policy maker workshops with different user groups in coastal communities to understand the perceptions of key marine environmental issues and legislation. These perceptions were used to map scientific priorities with a view to understanding the role that heritage and culture has played in forging them.

Research Assistant: Orla-Peach Power

Orla-Peach is a recent graduate of the MA in Digital Arts and Humanities at University College Cork where she studied the application of photogrammetry in recording at risk commemorative stone monuments from the sixteenth – seventeenth centuries respectively. During this time Orla-Peach developed skills in content management, 3D visualisation techniques and GIS. She is a co-founder of Digital Heritage Age, a collective of digital heritage specialists that record archaeological monuments and artifacts, and provide practical support to research institutes and community groups, enabling them to create and curate digital heritage collections.  Orla-Peach is responsible for visualising and communicating the range of data collated as part of the Deep Maps project, and is also charged with the task of developing and maintaining an online presence via social media platforms and an integrated website.

Research Assistant: Dr Michael Waldron

Michael has recently completed his PhD at the School of English, University College Cork with a thesis titled Elizabeth Bowen and the Art of Visuality, for which he was awarded an Irish Research Council postgraduate scholarship. His research and teaching focuses on the intersection between literature and the visual arts, and he has published in the areas of cybergogy and nineteenth-century Irish art. He holds a BA in English and History of Art and an MA in English (Irish Writing) from University College Cork. He has previously conducted collaborative research on The Samuel Forde Project, co-curated the resulting exhibition at Crawford Art Gallery, Cork and co-edited the companion publication, Samuel Forde: Visions of Tragedy (2014). Currently Assistant Curator of Collections and Special Projects at the Crawford Art Gallery, Michael was responsible for investigating and collating archival material pertaining to the West Cork area between 1700 and 1920.

Research Assistant: Seán MacGabhann

Seán’s work in the marine environment began at the age of 16, when he started a career in the recreational SCUBA diving industry. He is a fully qualified PADI Divemaster with Oceandivers Ireland, having experienced the underwater worlds of Ireland and South East Asia. Sean undertook an M.Sc at University College Cork focusing particularly on marine mammals and their parasites. His love for all things marine allowed him to branch out into several different study areas, including bottlenose dolphin surveys on the river Shannon, post mortem examination of stranded cetacean species, and photo identification, to name but a few. After graduating in early 2016, Seán was selected to be part of the Deep Maps Cork project, where his focus was to write a scientific literature review on the wide range of marine issues effecting coastal communities on local, national and international scales.

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