Exhibition Review: Inside: Life in Children’s Homes and Institutions. National Museum Australia touring museum exhibition, Melbourne Museum, 29 August 2013 to 27 January 2014

摘要

In early 2003, the Community Affairs References Committee of the Australian Senate began an inquiry into the experiences of children in institutional care during much of the twentieth century. The inquiry arose from a plethora of complaints, amassed over decades, of neglect and gross abuse suffered by children in dozens of government- and church-run orphanages, children's homes, 'training centres' and reformatories across Australia. The Committee's report, handed down in August 2004, determined that approximately half a million Australians had experienced out-of-home care during their childhood and/or adolescence, of whom an enormous number had suffered abuse. The Committee coined a term to characterize this group, employing it as the title of the report: Forgotten Australians (Senate Community Affairs References Committee 2004).