ABSTRACT
This chapter assesses the significance of the Easter Rising for anticolonial movements beyond that of Ireland and the Irish diaspora. It focuses on New York City, which was not only the overseas capital of Irish nationalist agitation and mobilisation, but also served a similar function for a variety of other descent groups and diasporas. After an overview of some of these groups, it places the topic in a global context of world war and post-war anticolonial efforts to remap the colonial world. While recent work by Erez Manela and others has emphasised the role of Woodrow Wilson’s ideas in this project, this chapter argues instead for the centrality of the Easter Rising and the subsequent Irish revolution, as these were understood by both Irish and non-Irish intellectuals and activists in the cosmopolitan centre of New York. It explores the ways in which the Punjabi Lala Lajpat Rai responded to the Rising and how a variety of Irish nationalists sought to make common cause with such figures. I conclude with an analysis of an important but little-studied New York-based umbrella group called the League of Oppressed Peoples.
