Christine Kinealy

Even considering recent advances in the development of women's studies as a discipline, women remain underrepresented in the history and historiography of the Great Hunger. The various roles played by women, including as landowners, relief-givers, philanthropists, proselytizers and providers for the family, have received little attention. This publication examines the diverse and still largely unexplored role of women during the Great Hunger, shedding light on how women experienced and shaped the tragedy that unfolded in Ireland between 1845 and 1852. In addition to more traditional sources, the contributors also draw on folklore and popular culture. Women and the Great Hunger brings together the work of some of the leading researchers in Irish studies, with new scholarship, methodologies and perspectives. This book takes a major step toward advancing our understanding of the Great Hunger.

The Great Irish Famine was one of the most devastating humanitarian disasters of the 19th century. In a period of only five years, Ireland lost approximately 25% of its population through a combination of death and emigration. How could such a tragedy have occurred at the heart of the resource-rich British Empire? This work explores this question by focusing on a particular, and lesser-known, aspect of the Famine: that being the extent to which people throughout the world mobilized to provide money, food and clothing to assist the starving Irish.

In any sustained period of food shortages, hunger and famine, children are one of the most vulnerable groups in terms of disease and mortality. The Great Hunger that occurred in Ireland between 1845 and 1852 is no exception. This book explores the impact of the Famine on children and young adults through a variety of disciplinary perspectives, including literature, history, visual representations, folklore, and folk-memory. -- Publisher description.

This study examines the events that led up to the 1848 rising and examines the reasons for its failure. It places the rising in the context of political changes outside Ireland, especially the links between the Irish nationalists and radicals and republicans in Britain, France and north America.

This study offers invaluable insight in to a much-neglected area of historical research on this nineteenth-century political figure. Previous histories of O'Connell have dealt predominantly with his attempts to secure a repeal of the 1800 Act of Union and on his success in achieving Catholic Emancipation in 1829. Kinealy focuses in stead on O'Connell's contribution to the anti-slavery movement in the United States. She argues that by using his influences of Irish immigrants in the United States, O'Connell negotiated a position of importance in the international debate over the right to freedom.

This volume corrects that distortion "the Famine didn't happen in Ulster." Ulster was indeed spared what a local newspaper called "the horrors of Skibereen," but nonetheless, the severity of the famine, particularly in the winter 1846-7, is all too apparent in each of the nine counties. 95 inmates of Lurgan Workhouse died in one week in February 1847; and 351 people queued to get into Enniskillen Workhouse in one day. What was done to limit the tragedy? Contentious issues such as the effectiveness of government relief measures, the response of local landlords, and the role of the churches are all assessed.

"The Irish Famine of 1845-52, although a pivotal event in the development of modern Ireland, was for decades marginalised or ignored by Irish historians. In examining the reasons for this silence, Famine expert Christine Kinealy demonstrates how many current attitudes and arguments about the Famine were evident during the event itself. The influences that shaped the responses to the Famine represent a core theme of this book." "Dr Kinealy focuses on the key factors which nurtured both policy formulations and the unfolding of events in mid-nineteenth-century Ireland. These include political ideologies, such as the influential doctrine of political economy; providentialist ideas which ordained that the potato blight was a 'judgement of God'; and an opportunistic interpretation of the crisis that viewed the Famine and the consequent social dislocation as an opportunity to reconstruct Irish society. Kinealy also examines the roles of the Irish landlords and merchants, political factions in Westminster and the pivotal role played by civil servants within the British government."--Jacket.