When one considers issues that are crucial to the evolution of French and Irish culture and behaviour, it is doubtful if there is anything more pertinent than globalisation and secularisation. Clearly, the experience of these concepts in both countries varies greatly: for example, while the French demonstrate a certain 'mefiance' - even 'mepris' - towards the globalistion project, which they associate with Hollywood, Microsoft, McDonalds and very little that is positive, the Irish, particularly during the Celtic Tiger years, were enthused by the possibilities it offered in terms of material gain and liberation from the excessive control of the Roman Catholic Church. In relation to the latter, many commentators argue that globalisation brought a more secular mindset to Ireland in recent decades, whereas in France the term 'laicite' is strongly identified with the Republican ideology that dates back to the French Revolution. Clearly, therefore, the theme is a revealing one. Cet ouvrage, qui contient des articles rediges en anglais et en francais, est compose des Actes du 4e Colloque franco-irlandais qui a eu lieu a l'universite Rennes 2 en mai 2008 sous l'egide du NCFIS.

In Erin and Iran, ten essays by North American and European scholars discuss parallel themes in and interactions between Irish and Iranian cultures. In the first section three essays explore common elements in pre-Christian Irish and pre-Islamic Iranian mythologies, common elements that have often been pointed out by scholars of Indo-European mythology but rarely examined in detail. In the following section four essays address literary subjects, ranging from medieval romances such as Tristan and Isolde and Vis and Ramin to twentieth-century novels such as James Joyce's Ulysses and Simin Daneshvar's Savushun. In the last section three nineteenth-century travelogues are presented, two written by Irish travelers to Iran and one written by an Indo-Persian traveler to Ireland. Together, these studies constitute the first-ever collection of articles dealing with cultural encounters between the Irish and the Iranians.