I. Ireland before and after the Great Famine: -- The story of the Great Irish Famine, 1845-52: a geographical perspective -- 'Mapping the people': the growth and distribution of the population -- The potato: root of the famine

The Great Irish Famine is the most pivotal event in modern Irish history, with implications that cannot be underestimated. Over a million people perished between 1845-1852, and well over a million others fled to other locales within Europe and America. By 1850, the Irish made up a quarter of the population in Boston, New York City, Philadelphia, and Baltimore. The 2000 US census had 41 million people claim Irish ancestry, or one in five white Americans. This book considers how such a near total decimation of a country by natural causes could take place in industrialized, 19th century Europe and situates the Great Famine alongside other world famines for a more globally informed approach. It seeks to try and bear witness to the thousands and thousands of people who died and are buried in mass Famine pits or in fields and ditches, with little or nothing to remind us of their going. The centrality of the Famine workhouse as a place of destitution is also examined in depth. Likewise the atlas represents and documents the conditions and experiences of the many thousands who emigrated from Ireland in those desperate years, with case studies of famine emigrants in cities such as Liverpool, Glasgow, New York and Toronto. The Atlas places the devastating Irish Famine in greater historic context than has been attempted before, by including over 150 original maps of population decline, analysis and examples of poetry, contemporary art, written and oral accounts, numerous illustrations, and photography, all of which help to paint a fuller picture of the event and to trace its impact and legacy. In this comprehensive and stunningly illustrated volume, over fifty chapters on history, politics, geography, art, population, and folklore provide readers with a broad range of perspectives and insights into this event. -- Publisher description

II. The Great Hunger: -- The longue duree- imperial Britain and colonial Ireland -- The colonial dimensions of the Great Irish Famine -- British relief measures -- The operation of the Poor Law during the famine -- The largest amount of good: Quaker relief efforts -- 'Born astride a grave': the geography of the dead

III. The workhouse: -- The creation of the workhouse system -- Classify, confine, discipline and punish- the Roscrea Union: a microgeography of the workhouse system during the famine -- Ulster workhouses- ideological geometry and conflict

IV. Population decline and social transformations: -- Mortality and the Great Famine -- 'Variations in vulnerability': understanding where and why the people died -- Medical relief and the Great Famine -- Emigration to North America in the era of the Great Famine, 1845-55 -- The cities and towns of Ireland, 1841-51 -- Connacht: the province of Connacht and the Great Famine -- Leinster: the province of Leinster and the Great Famine -- Munster: the province of Munster and the Great Famine -- Ulster: the province of Ulster and the Great Famine

V. Witnessing: the famine: -- The Great Famine in gaelic manuscripts -- Asenath Nicholson's Irish journeys -- Thomas Carlyle and famine Ireland -- 'Le pays classique de la faim': France and the Great Irish Famine

VI. The scattering: -- Exodus from Ireland- patterns of emigration -- Liverpool and the Great Irish Famine -- Irish Famine refugees and the emergence of Glasgow Celtic Football Club -- Black '47 and Toronto, Canada -- The famine and New York City -- The Great Famine and Australia -- 'Week after week, the eviction and the exodus': Ireland and Moreton Bay, 1848-52

VII. Legacy: -- Land reform in post-famine Ireland -- Legacy and loss: the Great Silence and its aftermath -- Famine and the Irish diaspora

VIII. Remembering the Famine: -- The folklore of the famine: Seanchas an Drochshaoil -- Sites of memory -- The big house and famine memory: Strokestown Park House -- Mapping the Great Famine in Irish art -- Literature and the famine

IX. Hunger and famine today: -- The Great Hunger and today's famines -- Food security, food poverty, food sovereignty: moving beyond labels to a world of change? -- Fighting world hunger in the twenty-first century