Presence of Absence

Black Children and Erased Histories of Abuse in Ireland’s Institutional Record

Abstract

This article examines the erasure of Black children from public discourse on 20th-century Irish institutional abuse, situating their exclusion within a racial logic that marked them as morally and biologically other. It interrogates the epistemic and testimonial injustices embedded within Ireland’s historical and contemporary treatment of Black children, with particular focus on the 2021 Mother and Baby Homes Commission. It critiques the reliance on institutional records over survivor testimonies, revealing how these children’s racialisation intersected with gender and class to marginalise them within both care institutions and national memory. By employing an intersectional and feminist framework, it explores the implications of these omissions for transitional justice and human rights accountability, calling for the inclusion of racialised narratives in Ireland’s reckoning with its institutional past. This study advances a critical understanding of racial injustice within Ireland’s care system, advocating for reparatory justice and the centring of Black survivors’ voices in processes of historical redress and collective memory formation.