Scholarcast 32: Famine Commemoration and Migration

Since the 150th anniversary of the Irish Famine in the 1990s, the Famine has been the subject of a remarkable commemorative boom, with more than one hundred public monuments newly constructed worldwide. Over the past decade Dr Emily Mark-FitzGerald has completed the first large-scale documentation of worldwide Famine monuments, which includes examples erected in Ireland, Northern Ireland, England, Scotland, Wales, the United States, Canada, and Australia. In this overview of her project, she discusses the significance of Famine commemoration -- its relationship to a visual culture of Famine representation, and the place of the Famine's memory in contemporary public space and discourse. This study addresses both community and national forms of commemoration and memorialization, investigating the business of their making, the iconography they draw from and create, and the narratives of their becoming.