Kilkenny Oral History

The Kilkenny Community Oral History Project set out to explore the origins, boundaries, place-names and the characteristics of four communities within Kilkenny City. Each of the areas has a local identity and geographic footprint familiar to older people but not fully explored and recorded.

Place names are an important part of Kilkenny’s rich cultural heritage.  But where did the names come from?  The Kilkenny Community Oral History Project is a community education and heritage exploration set in a number of city parishes in Kilkenny, seeking to record the various names and uncover their complex origins.

Kilkenny City is mainly divided into parishes: St Canice’s, St Mary’s, St John’s and St Patrick’s, however, there are further layers of names beyond those and there is a shared knowledge and interest in these titles.

The Kilkenny Community Oral History Project set out to explore the origins, boundaries, place-names and the characteristics of four communities within Kilkenny City. Each of the areas, The Butts, The Continent, The Village and The Riochs, has a local identity and geographic footprint familiar to older people but not fully explored and recorded.

Using a community education model the project with support from the local VEC and Kilkenny LEADER Partnership, set out to explore the social history of the four areas engaging with local people on a twelve week collaborative oral history project.

Participants came together weekly and working with a facilitator shared their knowledge, detailing the extents and boundaries of each area, in addition to sharing memories of life in the community through the years.  The process saw local people actively engage in an exploration of their community, using personal recollections and stories to create an oral record of their place within the city’s heritage.

This research will result in a collection of valuable documentation for locals, visitors and students interested in local history or for those looking for a model to identify and explore their own town’s history.

The website below also contains audio clips from several of the interviews, which you are welcome to listen to.