Koreans make up the oldest and largest population of transnationally, transracially adopted people in the United States, so their perspectives on their experiences are essential to understanding the benefits, risks, and global implications of adoption from any country. Such understanding has never been more important than it is today, because transnational adoption is booming. In the past 10 years, the number of foreign children adopted into the United States has nearly tripled to more than 22,000 a year. Thanks to the star power of actress Angelina Jolie, who adopted a son from Cambodia and a daughter from Ethiopia, the trend has even taken on a Hollywood sheen.
Yet the national conversation about transnational adoption is mostly steered by adoptive parents, researchers, and adoption agencies. Go to a local bookstore’s adoption section and, in addition to Adoption for Dummies, you’ll find any number of memoirs or anthologies written by adoptive parents. Meanwhile, the accounts of transnational adoptees are tucked away on the autobiography or Asian-studies shelves. In the debate about transnational adoption that was sparked by Madonna’s intention to adopt a toddler boy from Malawi, almost every publication of note published an essay by an adoptive parent or adoption professional. Voices of those who have lived the experience were almost nonexistent outside the blogosphere. But change is in the air. Adopted Koreans, as well as people adopted from Vietnam, the Philippines, and Colombia, are not only connecting across state lines, national borders, and oceans—they’re speaking for themselves, too.
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