The Irish through British eyes : perceptions of Ireland in the Famine era / Edward G. Lengel.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Lengel, Edward G.

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Public opinion--Great Britain--History--19th century.

Public opinion.

Famines--Public opinion--Great Britain.

Famines.

Ireland--History--Famine, 1845-1852.

Ireland.

Ireland--Foreign public opinion, British--History--19th century.

Ireland--Relations--Great Britain.

Great Britain--Relations--Ireland.

Great Britain.

Physical Description:

1 online resource (197 p.)

Edition:

1st ed.

Distribution:

London : Bloomsbury Publishing, 2024

Place of Publication:

Westport, Conn. : Praeger, 2002.

Language Note:

English

Summary:

The mainstream British attitude toward the Irish in the first half of the 1840s was based upon the belief in Irish improvability. Most educated British rejected any notion of Irish racial inferiority and insisted that under middle-class British tutelage the Irish would in time reach a standard of civilization approaching that of Britain. However, the potato famine of 1846-1852, which coincided with a number of external and domestic crises that appeared to threaten the stability of Great Britain, led a large portion of the British public to question the optimistic liberal attitude toward the Irish. Rhetoric concerning the relationship between the two peoples would change dramatically as a result. Prior to the famine, the perceived need to maintain the Anglo-Irish union, and the subservience of the Irish, was resolved by resort to a gendered rhetoric of marriage. Many British writers accordingly portrayed the union as a natural, necessary and complementary bond between male and female, maintaining the appearance if not the substance of a partnership of equals. With the coming of the famine, the unwillingness of the British government and public to make the sacrifices necessary, not only to feed the Irish but to regenerate their island, was justified by assertions of Irish irredeemability and racial inferiority. By the 1850s, Ireland increasingly appeared not as a member of the British family of nations in need of uplifting, but as a colony whose people were incompatible with the British and needed to be kept in place by force of arms.

Contents:

Machine generated contents note: 1. Race, Gender, Class and the Historiography of English

Perceptions of the Irish 1

2. Public Perceptions of the Irish Question, 1840-1845 19

3. Official Britain and the Condition of the Ireland Question,

1841-1852 55

4. The Famine and English Public Opinion, 1845-1850 97

5. Aftermath of Disaster: Public Perceptions of the Irish

Question, 1850-1860 129.

Notes:

Bibliographic Level Mode of Issuance: Monograph

Includes bibliographical references (p. [167]-178) and index.

ISBN:

9798400672736

9786610422913

9781280422911

1280422912

9780313012440

031301244X

OCLC:

567919888