Talk:Legacy of the Great Irish Famine

Revisionism
Coming to this through answers.com, it appears that some rosy revisionist assumptions need to be taken on. Broad Irish support for Queen Victoria? A startling claim, not least when there seems to be some creative sleight of hand going here on as to who is being counted as "the Irish". And to think that Americans are being taken to task and lectured on historical truth and accuracy! It is hardly surprising that the Protestant, Unionist descendants of English colonists would welcome her with shows of patriotism. And why is the Land War not _at all_ mentioned as part of the aftermath of the Famine?


 * Actually, whoever you are (ever think about signing your comment???) until the late 1870s Irish political meetings, nationalist Irish political meetings, finished with the singing of God Save the Queen. In the 1880s the Prince and Princess of Wales and the Duke of Clarence were able to walk through Dublin without bodyguards. The Prince of Wales was a regular visitor to Ireland all through that period. Indeed in the mid 1920s, the Princess Royal and her husband holidayed in Ireland, including in the Galway gaeltacht, without any hostility whatsoever. And that was only a couple of years after the War of Independence and the Civil War. When George V visited Ireland in 1911 he drew bigger (nationalist) crowds than assembled at any stage up until Pope John Paul II's visit in 1979. And nationalists marked the visit by selling drawings on the street of Dublin of the King opening the new Home Rule parliament in Grattan's old parliament building. (You can still find those drawings around Dublin.) Oh and by the way, in the 1930s, Dublin sold more poppies in the days leading up to Remembrance Day that Belfast and Liverpool combined! And crowds of 100,000+ used to attend ceremonies for Remembrance Day in College Green, while the Catholic Archbishop of Dublin used to celebrate a High Mass on Remembrance Sunday in the Pro-Cathedral in Dublin. De Valera himself was due to open the gardens in honour of the Irish First World War dead in 1939, but pulled out when the Second World War was due to start lest it compromise Irish Neutrality.


 * It wasn't the "Protestant Unionist descendants of English colonists" who sang the God Save the Queen, it was people like Issac Butt - while Tim Healy wanted a member of the Royal Family made Governor-General in a home rule Ireland in the 1880s (he told a radical British MP who was so surprised he recorded it in his diary). Actually Protestant Unionist descendants of English colonists, as you put it, weren't fans of Victoria because she was famously critical of anti-Catholic and anti-Irish attitudes in Britain in the 1880s. She told one senior Tory who had a function delivered a diatribe against "Roman Paddies" - "How dare you insult my Irish subjects. I will not tolerate that sort of disrespect for anyone in my home." (She ordered him to be removed and barred from any events she attended in future.) Some unionists were so critical of her they called her "Mrs O'Brien" and noted the rumours that her actual father was her mother's Irish secretary, Sir John Conroy.


 * Your knowledge of 19th and 20th century Irish history is somewhat flawed, to put it mildly. The reality is a good deal more complex than you seem to know. If you spent some time reading the archives you might just realise the true complexities. Fear ÉIREANN  01:11, 13 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Impact on the Irish language
I'm not sure I know enough about this to write it myself (and I am sure I don't have time to research it myself), but it would be good if someone could add a section on the impact of the Famine on the Irish language: native Irish speakers from the west were, I believe, disproportionately more likely to have died or emigrated because of the famine than English speakers. I'm sure I've seen Irish linguists state the opinion that the Famine was the beginning of the end for the Irish language. Angr (talk • contribs) 16:05, 18 April 2006 (UTC)


 * I was going to put in the same request. The omission is glaring. LeoO3 04:49, 27 June 2006 (UTC)

Main Article
Shouldn't this be combined with the main article, Irish_Potato_Famine_%281845-1849%29? It just seems like a waste to have two articles about one thing. Paulintheflesh 00:33, 25 January 2007 (UTC)

Irish Accusing Irish?
I changed the confusing statement to "sometimes accusing some other historians" which I understand doesn't flow very well, but I'm not completely sure of what the previous statement was trying to say. Originally, it sounded (in context with what the paragraph before had said as well) as if it was belittling the Irish and American historians as simply being stubborn and whining about "modern historians'" research, (although granted I am tired right now so I could have been reading it incorrectly) yet that still doesn't explain how the "many Irish historians" are accusing "Irish historians" of rewriting history...at the very least there needs to be a citation or expansion on who exactly is accusing who, and of what specifically. Irish♣Pearl 02:24, 12 March 2007 (UTC)
 * There were two references for this - both dead links. I removed one, and found the quote on another page on the same site for the second.  It doesn't appear to be "many historians" after all - instead it's one librarian.  Adjusted accordingly, and moved it further up in the section so that the pro- and anti- voices are together. Bastun Ėġáḍβáś₮ŭŃ! 09:00, 24 April 2011 (UTC)

POV statement
I've flagged this following sentence as POV. I think it needs rephrasing, feels like "flamebait".

"What is undeniable is that the British government reacted in a far different way than they would have if the famine had occurred in England, even though Ireland was part of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland"

Weasel-wording: "What is undeniable". Plus I'd like to know how the author of the sentence can give us proof that the British Government would have acted "far different(ly)" if the famine had occurred in England instead of Ireland. Very likely this is true, but can it be proved? Are there records of conversations or statements made by politicians so indicate so? --mgaved 14:39, 9 April 2007 (UTC)


 * I'm going to delete it.
 * Seraphim Whipp 15:59, 1 May 2007 (UTC)

Errors of fact and interpretation
I believe there are several statements of fact and interpretations appearing in this entry that are, to my mind, questionable and far from neutral, and should be edited. The first is this: 'Many Irish and American historians, however, still insist that what happened was genocide....' Such a statement implies that the question of the Irish famine as genocide is a hypothesis which has considerable weight among professional historians of Ireland, which it does not. After many years of attending conferences on the Famine (as an Irish historian myself at a major university) I know of no major historians of the Famine who would support the genocidal hypothesis, with perhaps the exception of Christine Kinealy. Of the major recent historians of Famine (by this I mean individuals who have published book-length histories of the Famine, including Donnelly, O'Grada, Gray, Daly, Mokyr, and perhaps Miller) none would support this view; to suggest that this is otherwise is a distortion. If others dispute this statement, please provide a list of corresponding published references (by reputable and institutionally-affiliated academics) where the authors make such a claim. I do agree with the statement that the genocidal hypothesis is one held by many (particularly in the U.S.)-- just not by professional historians of the Famine.

I similarly think the Seamus Metress quote should be deleted, as in any case it only represents one side of the revisionist argument (at this stage an exhausted debate which is better and more objectively covered elsewhere). At the very least there is no little irony in the fact that Metress claims revisionists 'present sociopolitical propaganda under the guise of scholarly writing.', when one's own office door at university is plastered with stickers of Bobby Sands, a bumper sticker demanding the return of Northern Ireland to Ireland, and photographs glamourising IRA militants (http://media.www.independentcollegian.com/media/storage/paper678/news/2006/01/30/News/Profs.Use.Doors.To.Open.Peoples.Minds-1520652.shtml).

On another subject, the statements appearing about the 100th anniversary of the Famine are incorrect: 'Then, no commemorations were held.' Commemorations were indeed held, though it is true they in no way approached the scale of the 1990s commemorations. In addition to the scholarly volume on the Famine commissioned by de Valera as a commemoration (delayed for publication until the 1960s), the Irish folklore commission also undertook a major oral history project of Famine memories (often referred to as The Famine Survey) in 1945, consisting of thousands of pages of material, now held in the Irish Folklore archives at University College Dublin. If one surveys regional papers in Ireland around 1947 (as I have done), you will also find occasional references to famine commemorative masses and ceremonies held around the country. Two of the scholars who have published interesting work on the subject of commemoration of the famine (who have examined the historical record and are not just working off assumptions) are Cormac O'Grada and Christopher Morash.

I would also question the suggestion that 'The horrors of the recent Holocaust may also have played a role in preventing people from wanting to relive the Famine' -- is it reasonable to suggest that in Ireland of 1945 the full extent of the Holocaust was understood as it is now? I have not yet come across a reference to both Famine and the holocaust in any newspaper or text from the 1940s which I have seen, but would welcome any corrections or citations that can be offered.

Acabado 11:23, 12 August 2007 (UTC)

Fields of Anfield Road
In the section 'the famine in song' it states that Liverpool fans sing fields of athenry which is not true. They sing fields of Anfield rd which is sung to the tune, but made up of lyrics that have nothing to do with the famine —Preceding unsigned comment added by 213.121.151.142 (talk) 22:17, 4 May 2008 (UTC)

WikiProject Food and drink Tagging
This article talk page was automatically added with WikiProject Food and drink banner as it falls under Category:Food or one of its subcategories. If you find this addition an error, Kindly undo the changes and update the inappropriate categories if needed. The bot was instructed to tagg these articles upon consenus from WikiProject Food and drink. You can find the related request for tagging here. Maximum and careful attention was done to avoid any wrongly tagging any categories, but mistakes may happen... If you have concerns, please inform on the project talk page -- TinucherianBot (talk) 21:38, 3 July 2008 (UTC) I find this tagging to be just a tad strange, as the article is talking about the sociopolitical effects of a historical event. But I do not know the system used by WikiProject, within that framework it may be logical. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 138.188.100.224 (talk) 00:22, 27 May 2009 (UTC)

Conversion rate?
The article states that Queen Victoria donated: "£2,000, the equivalent of €70,000" in 21st scentury Irish currency. Where did this figure come from? It seems inaccurate since it is a rule of thumb that applies generally that £1 of the Victorian period is equivalent in spending power to £100 today. Therefore the £2,000 would be roughly equivalent to £200,000 in today's pounds and something like 230,000 in Euros.  Xan  dar  21:18, 5 December 2009 (UTC)

Fenians?
An important omission from this article seems to be any account of the development of the revolutionary Fenian movement and Fenian Brotherhood which came to the fore following the Great Famine in Ireland, and among exiles in the United States. I think this is something that deserves a section.  Xan  dar  21:24, 5 December 2009 (UTC)

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Was Ireland a "threat"?
"However, while it could easily be said that the famine and its after-effects ended conclusively any chance of Ireland ever being a military or economic threat to Britain again"

I don't think this is more than hyperbole. During the industrial revolution and with the Royal Navy there could be no "threat". Ireland wasn't producing anything that Britain couldn't buy elsewhere.78.17.1.50 (talk) 11:25, 5 April 2019 (UTC)