Archives, Access & Human Rights

Archives, both public and private, are essential to both historical inquiry and to individuals whose identities and pasts are revealed by them. We wish to explore two issues: access to official records, generated by government agencies and local authorities; and access to records consulted (many of them the property of religious congregations) and created by the various bodies which investigated Industrial Schools, Magdalene Laundries and Mother and Baby Homes. The latter records are supposed to be eventually located in the proposed Centre for Research and Remembrance at Sean McDermott St., Dublin. Speakers will include archivists, historians, civil servants, and survivor-focused human rights experts.

Programme

Morning sessions: Public Records in Ireland and access to them

9.45-10.00am: Welcome and introduction - Catriona Crowe, MRIA

10.00-10.30am: Public Archives, Access and the Role of Advocacy
Niamh Ni Charra, Chair of Archives and Records Association, Ireland.
Chair:  Mary O’Dowd MRIA, Professor Emeritus of Gender History, QUB

10.30-11.00am: Access to Local Authority Records in Donegal
Niamh Brennan, Archivist, Donegal County Council
Chair: Catriona Crowe MRIA

11.00-11.30am: Coffee

11.30-12.00pm: Archival Sources for the History of the Department of Finance
Ciaran M. Casey, author of The Irish Department of Finance, 1959-1999
Chair: Felix M. Larkin, FRHistS, former public servant

12.00-12.30pm: Access to Local Authority, Prison and Mental Health Records
Maria Luddy, Professor Emerita, University of Warwick
Chair: Lisa Godson, cultural historian, NCAD

12:30-1:00pm: Discussion and Q+A with speakers
Moderator: Diarmaid Ferriter MRIA Professor of Modern Irish History, UCD

1.00-2.00pm: Lunch

Afternoon sessions: Records of Inquiries into Industrial Schools, Magdalene Laundries and Mother and Baby Homes

2.00-2.30pm: Institutional Archives and Human Rights Implications of Lack of Access to them
Maeve O’Rourke, Clann Project and Irish Centre for Human Rights, University of Galway
Chair: James Smith, Professor of English & Irish Studies at Boston College, and author of Ireland’s Magdalen Laundries and the Nation’s Architecture of Containment

2.30-3.00pm: Archival Aspects of the Northern Ireland Truth Recovery Programme
Martin Carey, Director, Executive Office, Northern Ireland Civil Service, and Director of the Truth Recovery Programme TBC
Chair TBC

3.00-3.30pm: Archival Preparations   the National Centre for Research and Remembrance
Laura McGarrigle, Assistant Secretary, Adoption, Mother and Baby Homes and Research Division in the Dept. of Children, Equality, Disability, Integration and Youth
Chair: Catriona Crowe MRIA

3.30-4:00pm: Coffee

4.00-4.30pm: The Archival Preservation of Survivor Testimony
Claire McGettrick, born Lorraine Hughes, Adopted Person and Co-Founder, Clann Project
Chair: Patricia Carey, Special Advocate for Survivors

4.30-5:00pm: Discussion and Q+A with speakers
Moderator: Fintan O’Toole MRIA, Irish Times journalist and author of We Don’t Know Ourselves

5.00pm: Closing remarks and reception

Access Requirements

Have you got any access requirements that we can assist you with, so that you can fully engage with our event? Please let us know by contacting our access officer in advance of the event, by email: accessofficer@ria.ie