The Great Hunger & Its Aftermath: Famine, Migration, Identity

3 units

Although the fungal blight (Phytophthera infestans) that decimated potato crops in Ireland in the mid-nineteenth century began one of the most monumental shifts in human geography in the modern world, it is still not well understood by the majority of people. With a population of just over 8.2 million in 1845, Ireland's numbers dropped to 5.5 million in a little less than six years due to starvation, disease, and emigration; Ireland has never recovered this lost population, and today 6.3 million people live on the island. It has been estimated that close to 80 million people of Irish heritage now inhabit the globe, with approximately 44 million of these dwelling in the United States. How did they get to where they are now? What were the causes of this massive migration? What have been some of the consequences? What can we learn from an examination of the literary and cultural productions of the Irish diaspora around the world? How does the post-famine migration history of the Irish compare with other nineteenth-century migrations? How have such migrations shaped the modern world? What do generational silences signify regarding the horror of the experience of famine, disease, starvation, and exile? What role does politics play in such cases? Can we learn to respond better to modern famines? This course will ask and endeavor to answer these and other questions about the human catastrophe that the Irish refer to as An Gorta Mór, The Great Hunger.