Monuments and Memorials of the Great Famine

Ireland's Great Hunger Museum at Quinnipiac University publishes Famine Folios, a unique resource for students, scholars and researchers, as well as general readers, covering many aspects of the Famine in Ireland from 1845 - 1852 - the worst demographic catastrophe of nineteenth-century Europe. The essays are interdisciplinary in nature, and make available new research in Famine studies by internationally established scholars in history, art history, cultural theory, philosophy, media history, political economy, literature and music. This publications initiative is devised to augment the Museum experience, and is part of the Museum's commitment to making its collection accessible to audiences of all ages and levels of educational interest. The booklets are produced to the highest level, beautifully illustrated with works from the Museum and related collections. It ensures that audiences have access to the latest scholarship as it pertains to both the historical and contemporary dimensions of the collection. Commemorative projects, born out of conflicting memories, can be problematic. Catherine Marshall challenges the coarsening of history by the construction of commemorative monuments that are thought to provide closure over the events that they mark. She explores how imaginative artists help us to work into and through the past. Through the vitality of her artists, at home and abroad, Ireland and the diaspora have attempted to come to terms with some of the inherited legacies of the Great Hunger, the most devastating event in modern Irish history.