Settler colonial expansion and the institutionalisation of children in Victoria, Australia

Recent histories have underlined the importance of understanding the nineteenth-century gold rushes which took place in various parts of the anglophone world in relation to settler colonialism, and this work has advanced understandings of gender, race and Empire in significant ways. However, the field has yet to seriously grapple with questions about the role, treatment and positioning of children. This article will examine the Australian colony of Victoria, which was profoundly transformed by a gold rush beginning in 1851. Through case studies of three families – one white, one Chinese and one Aboriginal – the article will illustrate the complex relationships between poverty, colonialism and carceral institutions for children during the second half of the nineteenth century. These case studies allow an exploration that centres on the lives of the children and families forced to navigate an often-inescapable network of institutions, thereby demonstrating the impossibility of separating these institutions (which form the foundations of our modern-day child protection system) from the project and philosophy of settler colonialism.