Description
Book SynopsisThis book is the product of Donald Akenson's decades of research and writing on Irish social history and its relationship to the Irish diaspora - it is also the product of a lifetime of trying to figure out where Swedish-America actually came from, and why. These two matters, Akenson shows, are intimately related. Ireland and Sweden each provide a tight case study of a larger phenomenon, one that, for better or worse, shaped the modern world: the Great European Diaspora of the "true" nineteenth century. Akenson's book parts company with the great bulk of recent emigration research by employing sharp transnational comparisons and by situating the two case studies in the larger context of the Great European Migration and of what determines the physics of a diaspora: no small matter, as the concept of diaspora has become central to twenty-first-century transnational studies. He argues (against the increasing refusal of mainstream historians to use empirical databases) that the history community still has a lot to learn from economic historians; and, simultaneously, that (despite the self-confidence of their proponents) narrow, economically based explanations of the Great European Migration leave out many of the most important aspects of the whole complex transaction. Akenson believes that culture and economic matters both count, and that leaving either one on the margins of explanation yields no valid explanation at all.
Trade ReviewThis monumental study clearly will have a huge impact in the field. Typically of Akenson, an original thinker of the first order, it debunks many myths, half-truths, and lazy assumptions on the part of historians. However, this isn't simply a book which debunks. It isn't a tract or a treatise. Its central contribution is in offering one of the best (perhaps the very best) comparative history of European emigration.
Donald MacRaild'This book stands as a remarkable text that weaves statistical analysis with incisive historiograohical commentary to produce a lively argument. Summing Up: Highly recommended. All levels/libraries.'
M.J. O'Brien,Choice, Vol. 49, No. 07
Akenson has presented us with an insightful and engaging book whose greatest weakness is its miniscule typeface; the fact that I was nonetheless willing to pore over its every page is testimony enough to the quality of its content.
Walter D. Kamphoefner, Historical Methods: A Journal of Quantitative and Interdisciplinary HistoryIreland, Sweden and the Great European Migration is a vital and thought-provoking read, not only for the scholar interested in Ireland’s and Sweden’s history and migration and European history and migration more generally, but also comparative endeavours.
Angela McCarthy, Australasian Journal of Irish Studies 12This is a masterful economic-demographic study by a master of that approach. As such, emigrant voices usually count for little, for as has been argued, statistics do not bleed—neither do they tell the claims of a steamship agent, cheer the arrival of an “America letter,” or breathe with both sadness and hope as the ship turns from the coast and the beloved but wretched homeland fades in the distance.
Mark Wyman, The American Historical Review Volume 117, Issue 4Table of Contents
- 1. Introduction
- 2. Were They in the Same Boat
- 3. Shouldn't They Be Leaving in Droves?
- 4. Leading Sectors: Sweden
- 5. Leading Sectors: Ireland
- 6. Deprivation and Famine
- 7. After Axial Stress
- 8. Convergence as Success
- 9. A Most Controlled Country
- 10. Open Verdicts
- 11. Epilogue
- Select Bibliography
- Index
