Between Legacy and Agency: Italo-Eritreans Raised in Orphanages and Their Access to Italian Citizenship

In Eritrea, Italian colonialism introduced and regulated the opportunity for mixed-race individuals with Italian ancestry to obtain Italian citizenship. This opportunity was modified over time depending on changes in Italian and Eritrean citizenship laws. Moreover, laws and socialization shaped Italo-Eritreans as a minority and a “different” group that reproduced itself even after colonialism. Over time, the number of Italo-Eritreans varied as did their sense of belonging to a real or imagined community. The case of mixed-race children abandoned during Italian colonialism provides an insight into the importance of social institutions in building legal and social identities through socialization. Using an interdisciplinary, qualitative-quantitative approach, I focus on the convergence between the processes of inclusion within legal (citizenship) and social (identity) categories, as well as on the agency of Italo-Eritreans raised in orphanages in transforming a stigma into a resource to gain the Italian citizenship.