EP 21 The Great Famine in Ireland with Padraic X. Scanlon

adraic X. Scanlan joins Frank Armstrong to discuss his book Rot: A History of the Irish Famine, which explores the modernity of Ireland's experience with potato cultivation, culminating in the arrival of the dreaded blight phytophthora infestans in 1845. He reveals how Ireland became the guinea pig for British colonialism of the late nineteenth century, aspects of which linger to this day. Thus, the staggering inequality, pervasive debt, outrageous rent-gouging, precarious employment, and vulnerability to changes in commodity prices that torment so many in the twenty-first century were rehearsed in the Irish countryside before the potato failed. Episode Credits: Host: Frank Armstrong Music: Loafing Heroes - ​​https://theloafingheroes.bandcamp.com Produced by Massimiliano Galli - https://www.massimilianogalli.com