Both journal and society are committed to the study Irish labour history in the broadest sense - the economic, social and political formation of the Irish working class; the labour movement and working class culture; and the experiences of Irish working people abroad.

Saothar is the only scholarly periodical covering the important field of labour history in the Irish context.

Saothar is an essential source for anyone researching in the field of Irish labour history.

Saothar contains the following source information;

Contents of Saothar 24

Irish Labour History Society, 1997 - 98

Obituaries
J.W. Boyle
Jack Macgougan
Peter O'Connor

Correspondence

Music and Violence in Working Class Cork:
the 'Band Nuisance', 1879 - 82
by Fintan Lane

Technology, Labour and the Growth of Belfast Shipbuilding
by John Lynch

Sanitary Inspectors and the Reform of Housing Conditions for
Irish Migratory Potato Workers in Scotland from 1945 to the 1970s
by Heather Holmes

Essay
American Labour and the Irish Question, 1916 - 23
by David Brundage

Essays in reviews
Colder Light on the Good Fight: Revisiting Volunteers in the Spanish Civil War
by Barry McLoughlin

Labor Pro Bono Publico?
by Michael McGinley

Reviews
Martin J.Mitchell, The Irish in the West of Scotland 1797 - 1848:
Trade Unions, Strikes and Political Movements

Anthony M. Breen, The Cappoquin Rebellion, 1849

Séamus Ó Maitiú and Barry O Reilly, BallyKnockan:
A Wicklow Stonecutters' Village

John Lynch, A Tale of Three Cities: Comparative Studies
in Working-Class Life

Trevor Hooper, Robert Tressell's Hastings:
The Background to 'The Ragged Trousered Philanthropists'

Margaret Ward, Hanna Sheehy Skeffington: A Life

Donal Nevin (ed), James Larkin: Lion of the Fold

David McCullagh, A Makeshift Majority: The First Inter-Party
Government, 1948 - 1951; Eithne Macdermott, Clann na Poblachta

Andrew Boyd, Fermenting Elements: The Labour Colleges in Ireland, 1924 - 1964

L. Brown and Gilbert Levine (eds), Patrick Lenihan: From Irish Rebel
to Founder of Canadian Public Unionism

Helena Sheehan, Songs of Labour

Books received

Labour Lives
Cathal O'Shannon
by Emmet O Connor

Document Studies
Norah Walshe and the Rescue of Jim Connell
by Andrew Boyd, Francis Devine and Tommy Grimes

'A Quaint Curiosity': the History of the Irish Liver
Assurance Employees' Trade Union, 1948 - 1975
by Francis Devine

Sources
Sources for Labour, Social and Economic History
in Waterford City Archives

Records Related to Labour Parties in the Public
Record Office of Northern Ireland

The British Royal Commission on Historical Manuscripts
and Labour History Sources

A Companion to Selected Irish - Related Archives in the Mitchell
and Dixson Libraries, State Library of New South Wales

Electronic Sources for Labour History

Theses and Abstracts

Reminiscence
John Freeman: a Life on the Left
by Peter Collins

Conference Reports
ILHS, 1998

Limerick Soviet Anniversary Commemoration, 1999

3rd International Conference on May Day, Cuba, 1999

21st Annual North American Labour History Conference, Detroit, 1999

Bibliography
Irish Labour History, 1997 - 1998
by Deirdre O'Connell

Notes on Contributors