CORK is a city which is remarkably satisfied with its own culture and it has, in the past, seemed quite indifferent as to whether anyone else participated or not All that is set to change at the end of next month, when a new festival, A Sense Of Cork, opens, aimed at celebrating "the city's identity and creativity". The festival runs from June 21st to 29th and so includes St John's Eve on June 23rd, which has been celebrated in Cork for generations. While the preliminary programme is quite low key, there are highlights, such as the restaging of Celebration, a dance work by Royston Muldoon, which INB staged under Joan Denise Moriarty, a contemporary music series at the Crawford Art Gallery, and the Abbey's production of Michael Harding's Sour Grapes. Phone 021 274308 for further details.

Meanwhile, the autumn will see a major arts festival taking place in Cork, when the Irish Centre For Migration Studies is launched at UCC, from September 24th-28th. In tandem with a high profile conference, the Scatterings festival will include explorations of the theme of emigration, such as a new production of Donal O'Kelly's Asylum! Asylum!, directed by Vic Merriman, with the famous, once exiled, Ugandan performer, George Seremba, playing the refugee. There will be a "global hooley" with satellite concerts from Paris, London and New York (Pierce Turner is confirmed) and new music and dance commissioned from Mel Mercier, Fergus Johnston and David Bolger. And to cap it all, plain Mary Robinson, for this she will be, will deliver what Vie Merriman calls "the final speech on the theme of her presidency", (the light in the window and all that). Phone Marion Elders on 021 902898 for more information.