Generation Emigration: What’s new?

Generation Emigration is three years old. It began in October 2011 as a response by The Irish Times to the exodus of 80,000 people from Ireland that year. More left in 2012, and more again in 2013.

It would be nice to think the crisis is now over, that our economy is recovering, that the people who left can come home again. That’s not quite the case.

While emigration has fallen marginally, it’s still very much a feature of Irish life. And many of those who have left in recent years no longer want to come home, or just can’t at the moment.

Some have put down deep roots in their new homes: securing attractive jobs, buying property, starting families. The new Irish population in Canada, Australia and New Zealand is becoming more permanent - the number granted longer-term visas or permanent residency continues to rise.

When we began this project, we thought we were addressing the “mobile” generation of people in their twenties and thirties who were moving abroad, sometimes returning home again, and perhaps leaving again, on a regular basis. But as the correspondence first trickled, then poured in, we were pleasantly surprised that we got just as many submissions from people in their 40s, 50s, 60s, who had left Ireland in decades past. There is more than one “Generation Emigration”.

So we’re reaching out again, this time speaking to all those Irish people who have made new lives abroad.

The blog has grown into a larger subsite of irishtimes.com (still called Generation Emigration), which brings together all the news and features from other sections which relate to emigration, Irish life abroad, or the wider diaspora. Over the coming weeks and months, we’ll be adding more of the best stories from the archive.

We’ll be sending out a weekly newsletter, pointing out these Irish Times articles that we think will be of interest to Irish people living outside the island.

We're also publishing a series of new guides for people starting out in a new land. The first one, Destination Canada, is already on the site, and more will follow in the coming weeks and months.

Our favourite aspect of this project has been the many stories Irish people abroad have shared with Generation Emigration: almost 500 over three years. We'll continue to publish stories written by and written for Ireland's dispersed citizens in the Emigrant Voices section. If you'd like to contribute one yourself, email emigration@irishtimes.com.

Thanks for reading Generation Emigration.