Instructor: Dr. Zara Browne is an anthropologist who dedicated her doctoral research to the Irish Traveler community of Murphy Village in North Augusta, SC. She specializes in nomadic and separatist communities. Zara’s work in Murphy Village has been featured in multiple news outlets, including The Post and Courier and Augusta Today. Description: Were Irish Travelers always Irish Travelers? Were they once a part of the mainstream Irish population? What factors caused their separation from Irish society, or were they always their own people? In two class sessions, this course outlines the written records on the Irish Travelers community’s “appearance” in Europe, and some of their earliest recorded histories, including Irish Traveler nomadism, trades, and cultural insularity. You will also learn about the Irish Traveler people’s accounts of their own history and cultural formation in Ireland. This is the second course of the “Irish Traveler Origin Debates” series.