Emigration has been central to Irish life for more than two centuries. It was already significant before the 1840s Famine, but there was a massive outflow of people in the immediate aftermath of that disaster.
In recent times, there have also been periodic surges in emigration during economic crises in Ireland: in the 1950s, the 1980s and again after the economic crash post-2008.
Even in the 19th century, some of those who emigrated subsequently returned, though they were very much a minority. Recent research by Cormac Ó Gráda and Alan Fernihough examined returned emigrants using the 1911 census. While there was no direct question on this topic, the researchers were able to…