ESHS/HSS Annual Meeting

Epistemologies of Food and Climate During the Great Irish Famine

• In Event: Contested Knowledges of Climate, Food and Famine

English Abstract

This paper will consider the relationship between ‘scientific’ and ‘traditional’ epistemologies
during the great Irish Famine (1845-1853), by analysing responses to the Famine from scientists
alongside those of potato cultivators, for whom the Famine was an existential crisis. Because
these ways of knowing are preserved and recorded in different forms of knowledge, this
analysis will involve combining different kinds of sources. The voices of the educated classes
during the Famine are easy to access. They survive in scientific journals, economic pamphlets,
newspaper articles and more. The voices of Famine victims are far more difficult to access.
Most were illiterate, leaving no written record of their lives and experiences during the
Famine. The records of the Irish Folklore Commission provide a unique opportunity to hear
the voices of Famine victims, albeit refracted through at least a generation. However, folklore
has traditionally been considered a less reliable source by historians of the Famine and used
with caution. This paper will therefore consider what kind of knowledge production more
traditional historical approaches that rely on state or institutional archives ultimately replicate.
It will highlight the way in which valuable local knowledge during the Famine was made less
visible due to the dominance of scientific ways of knowing, which were considered more
significant and authoritative. Similar dynamics are at play today, in the relationship between
‘scientific’ and ‘traditional/Indigenous’ responses to the climate crisis. This paper will draw
upon these contemporary dynamics in order to reflect on the enduring colonial nature of
these epistemological relationships.

Author

• Aoife O’Leary McNeice, University of Galway