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Monday, February 20, 2012

Latin American Immigrants and others Parallel Irish Famine

With Aura in Geneva 2009 for the enactment of Jean Calvin's Anniversary...folks dressed as Calvinists

Couldn't help but be struct by the parallels between this description of Irish professor O Muchadha   of Famine immigrants to the  what I know of Salvadoran and other Central and South American immigrants to the Washington DC area:


However, surviving the voyage was not the end of the hardship for Famine emigrants. In fact, for most, it was just the beginning of a new chapter of desolation.



“A great number of these emigrants had never previously ventured outside their own local areas,” says Dr Ó Murchadha. “Suddenly, they found themselves transported thousands of miles away: from a rural to an urban landscape, to a very alien social environment where the inhabitants didn’t speak the same language and, frequently, showed a deep loathing for their Irishness and their Catholicism. This was bewildering and devastating to them.”


Read more: http://www.irishcentral.com/news/New-facts-about-Great-Famine-emigration-out-of-Ireland--revealed-139540423.html#ixzz1mw3NmfZi