Education:

BA, History, Vanderbilt University (Honors, Phi Beta Kappa)
MA, History, Boston College

Research Interests:

Megan Myers completed her BA at Vanderbilt University and an MA and PhD at Boston College.  Myers's research involves the international nature of the Northern Ireland conflict, the emergence of an international human rights culture and infrastructure, and global anti-terrorism efforts.  She has taught courses on the history of terrorism and the European Union and routinely teaches the history of Western Civilization and Early Modern and Modern Europe.  Here research and teaching interests involve the intersection of local politics and culture in international institutions, the media, and popular culture.  

Dissertation Abstract:

Between the outbreak of the conflict in Northern Ireland in the 1960s and the Good Friday Agreement in 1998, nationalists, unionists, and pacifists recruited supporters and confronted their adversaries on the streets of Derry and Belfast while also waging an ideological battle on an international stage. The international community brought significant pressure to bear on all those involved and played a key role in the eventual political resolution of the conflict. By the 1990s, the more assertive international community, marked by a stronger EU, a more interested U.S., a growing international media, and an influential peace movement altered the political landscape for groups on both sides by constraining violence and normalizing political engagement.

I contend that the relative success or failure of unionists, nationalists, and pacifists within the Northern Ireland political system was based in large part on their ability to navigate the changing global context. Nationalism was better able to adapt to the shifting norms of an international world, while unionism, which seemed to outsiders as increasingly colonial and archaic in the late twentieth century, closed itself off from the outside world. By the 1990s, violent militants of all sectarian stripes quickly lost their legitimacy as the major players sought to distance themselves from the armed struggles they once led. This international history of the conflict in Northern Ireland will clarify the overall trajectory of the conflict and shed light on the repercussions of ideological shifts and the creation of new global institutions to both international and local communities.

Conference Presentations:

• "Rights for Suspected Terrorists and Their Victims, The International Human Rights Debate Over the Northern Ireland Conflict,” British Scholar Conference, University of Texas Austin, March 31-April 1, 2011.   
• “The World is Watching: The Media as the Connection between the Local and the International in the Northern Ireland Conflict” Northeast Conference on British Studies Annual Meeting, 2008, Boston College, November 14-15 2008
• “An Old Conflict in a New Europe: European Language and Laws in the Conflict in Northern Ireland, 1973-1998,” paper presented at The Parish and the Universe NEACIS Meeting 2007, University of Massachusetts Boston, November 10, 2007.
• "Irish Nationalism on Tour: The Rise and Fall of Women Speaking for the Republic," at the ACIS-West Conference, Fall 2005.

Awards:

• Boston College Dissertation Fellowship 2009-2010
• Boston College Research Expense Grant, 2008
• Donald J. White Teaching Excellence Award, Boston College, 2006-2007