Ireland’s influence is visible throughout the world, not least in the vast numbers of people who trace their ancestry back to the women and men who emigrated from Ireland between the eighteenth and twentieth centuries. For many of us, names or fragments of Irish history will be familiar, whether through family stories or in popular culture: the Great Famine, the Easter Rising, Michael Collins, the IRA, and Bloody Sunday. Irish music, literature and films continue to demonstrate the nation’s remarkable creativity. But what is the history of Ireland and its peoples? How did a small nation come to experience a turbulent history marked by an extraordinary famine, a prolonged struggle for independence, and civil war? And importantly, how does the Irish past fit within the broader history of modern Europe? This course examines the history of Ireland from 1798 to the present. It investigates major developments in the social, cultural, political and economic history of the island from the United Irish Rising at the end of the eighteenth century to the early twenty-first century, including the creation of the state of Northern Ireland and ongoing attempts to secure a lasting peace there. Attention will also be paid to the vast emigration of Irish peoples across the globe, and the influence of the Irish abroad in shaping the contours of the last 200 years of Irish history.