Saving International Adoption

Saving International Adoption PDF Author: Mark Montgomery
Publisher: Vanderbilt University Press
ISBN: 0826521746
Category : Family & Relationships
Languages : en
Pages : 289

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Book Description
Choice Outstanding Academic Title of 2018 International adoption is in a state of virtual collapse, rates having fallen by more than half since 2004 and continuing to fall. Yet around the world millions of orphaned and vulnerable children need permanent homes, and thousands of American and European families are eager to take them in. Many government officials, international bureaucrats, and social commentators claim these adoptions are not "in the best interests" of the child. They claim that adoption deprives children of their "birth culture," threatens their racial identities, and even encourages widespread child trafficking. Celebrity adopters are publicly excoriated for stealing children from their birth families. This book argues that opposition to adoption ostensibly based on the well-being of the child is often a smokescreen for protecting national pride. Concerns about the harm done by transracial adoption are largely inconsistent with empirical evidence. As for trafficking, opponents of international adoption want to shut it down because it is too much like a market for children. But this book offers a radical challenge to this view—that is, what if instead of trying to suppress market forces in international adoption, we embraced them so they could be properly regulated? What if the international system functioned more like open adoption in the United States, where birth and adoptive parents can meet and privately negotiate the exchange of parental rights? This arrangement, the authors argue, could eliminate the abuses that currently haunt international adoption. The authors challenge the prevailing wisdom with their economic analyses and provocative analogies from other policy realms. Based on their own family's experience with the adoption process, they also write frankly about how that process feels for parents and children.

Saving International Adoption

Saving International Adoption PDF Author: Mark Montgomery
Publisher: Vanderbilt University Press
ISBN: 0826521746
Category : Family & Relationships
Languages : en
Pages : 289

Get Book

Book Description
Choice Outstanding Academic Title of 2018 International adoption is in a state of virtual collapse, rates having fallen by more than half since 2004 and continuing to fall. Yet around the world millions of orphaned and vulnerable children need permanent homes, and thousands of American and European families are eager to take them in. Many government officials, international bureaucrats, and social commentators claim these adoptions are not "in the best interests" of the child. They claim that adoption deprives children of their "birth culture," threatens their racial identities, and even encourages widespread child trafficking. Celebrity adopters are publicly excoriated for stealing children from their birth families. This book argues that opposition to adoption ostensibly based on the well-being of the child is often a smokescreen for protecting national pride. Concerns about the harm done by transracial adoption are largely inconsistent with empirical evidence. As for trafficking, opponents of international adoption want to shut it down because it is too much like a market for children. But this book offers a radical challenge to this view—that is, what if instead of trying to suppress market forces in international adoption, we embraced them so they could be properly regulated? What if the international system functioned more like open adoption in the United States, where birth and adoptive parents can meet and privately negotiate the exchange of parental rights? This arrangement, the authors argue, could eliminate the abuses that currently haunt international adoption. The authors challenge the prevailing wisdom with their economic analyses and provocative analogies from other policy realms. Based on their own family's experience with the adoption process, they also write frankly about how that process feels for parents and children.

The Complete Book of International Adoption

The Complete Book of International Adoption PDF Author: Dawn Davenport
Publisher: Harmony
ISBN: 0307483185
Category : Family & Relationships
Languages : en
Pages : 418

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Book Description
The go-to guide for everything you want to know about international adoption From the initial decision—Is adoption right for you?—through returning home with your child—How can you ease the transition?—The Complete Book of International Adoption takes parents step by step through the entire process of adopting a child from another country. You will find: • An easy-to-understand analysis of the differences between domestic and international adoption • Advice on choosing a country, including 25 important factors to consider, such as the waiting times involved and the estimated costs for each of the top placing countries, with charts for easy comparison • A detailed discussion of the potential health issues based on the latest research and interviews with doctors who specialize in international adoption • Worksheets and a suggested system for preparing and organizing the extensive paperwork involved • Parenting tips to enhance attachment and suggestions for addressing the issues that come up in raising an internationally adopted child • Real parents’ stories and advice at every stage of the process • Plus all of the information you need to select your agency, plan financially, prepare for the home study, travel sensibly, evaluate your child’s health and integrate your new family More than just provide the facts, The Complete Book of International Adoption also helps parents manage the emotional rollercoaster that comes with the territory. Sensitive, wise, and often witty, this book is a must-have for any parent considering building their family through adoption.

Parenting Your Internationally Adopted Child

Parenting Your Internationally Adopted Child PDF Author: Patty Cogen
Publisher: ReadHowYouWant.com
ISBN: 145876883X
Category : Family & Relationships
Languages : en
Pages : 418

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Book Description
Parenting Your Internationally Adopted Child guides adoptive parents in promoting a child's emotional and social adjustment, from the family's first hours together through the teen years. It explains how to help an adopted child cope with the ''Big Change,'' bond with new parents, become part of a family, and develop a positive self-image that incorporates both American identity and ethnicity origins. Parents waiting to meet their adoptive children will appreciate Cogen's advice about preparing for the trip and handling the first meeting. The author's main focus, though, is the child's adaptation over the next months and years. Cogen explains how to deal with the child's ''mixed maturities''; how (and why) to tell the child's story from the child's point of view; how to handle sleep problems and resistance to household rules; and how to encourage eye contact and ease transitions and separations. The reassuring narrative tone and the breadth and depth of information make this the most substantive and accessible book available and an indispensable resource for parents who adopt, professionals who advise adoptive parents, and teachers of adoptive children

Adoption Beyond Borders

Adoption Beyond Borders PDF Author: Rebecca J. Compton
Publisher: Oxford University Press
ISBN: 0190247819
Category : Psychology
Languages : en
Pages : 240

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Book Description
International adoptions have decreased dramatically in the last decade, despite robust evidence of the tremendous benefits that early placement in adoptive families can confer upon children who are not able to remain with birth families. Adoption Beyond Borders integrates evidence from a range of disciplines in the social and biological sciences-- including psychology, neuroscience, evolutionary biology, sociology, anthropology, and social work -- to provide a ringing endorsement of international adoption as a viable child welfare option. The author interweaves narrative accounts of her own adoption journey, which involved visiting a Kazakhstani orphanage daily for nearly a year, to illustrate the complexities and implications of the research evidence. Topics include: the effects of institutionalization on children's developing brains, cognitive abilities, and socio-emotional functioning; the challenges of navigating issues of identity when adopting across national, cultural, and racial lines; the strong emotional bonds that form even without genetic relatedness; and the methods in which adoptive families can address the special needs of children who experienced early neglect and deprivation, thereby providing a supportive environment in which those children can flourish. Striving to attain a balanced, evidence-based perspective on controversial issues, Adoption Beyond Borders argues that international adoption must be maintained and supported as a vital means of promoting international child welfare.

International Adoption

International Adoption PDF Author: Laura Briggs
Publisher: NYU Press
ISBN: 9780814795903
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 320

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Book Description
In the past two decades, transnational adoption has exploded in scope and significance, growing up along increasingly globalized economic relations and the development and improvement of reproductive technologies. A complex and understudied system, transnational adoption opens a window onto the relations between nations, the inequalities of the rich and the poor, and the history of race and racialization, Transnational adoption has been marked by the geographies of unequal power, as children move from poorer countries and families to wealthier ones, yet little work has been done to synthesize its complex and sometimes contradictory effects. Rather than focusing only on the United States, as much previous work on the topic does, International Adoption considers the perspectives of a number of sending countries as well as other receiving countries, particularly in Europe. The book also reminds us that the U.S. also sends children into international adoptions—particularly children of color. The book thus complicates the standard scholarly treatment of the subject, which tends to focus on the tensions between those who argue that transnational adoption is an outgrowth of American wealth, power, and military might (as well as a rejection of adoption from domestic foster care) and those who maintain that it is about a desire to help children in need.

Six When He Came to Us

Six When He Came to Us PDF Author: Ellie Porte Parker
Publisher: Dog Ear Publishing
ISBN: 9781457512179
Category : Family & Relationships
Languages : en
Pages : 188

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Book Description
The public perception concerning adoption of abandoned children has changed over the years from a belief that love would solve all problems to a fear that any child who had spent significant time in an orphanage was irreparably damaged. Neither sentiment is true. The social upheaval in Eastern Europe during the early 1990s left many children orphaned and living in deplorable conditions in orphanages. Many Americans rushed to adopt some of these children but in some cases, the challenges proved to be too great and some of these adoptive parents ended up killing the very children they wanted to help. Using her family's experiences and her knowledge as a child and family psychlogist, the author tries to shed some light on the many sides of international adoption.

The Best Possible Immigrants

The Best Possible Immigrants PDF Author: Rachel Rains Winslow
Publisher: University of Pennsylvania Press
ISBN: 0812249100
Category : Family & Relationships
Languages : en
Pages : 312

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Book Description
Rachel Rains Winslow examines how the adoption of foreign children transformed from a marginal activity in response to episodic crises in the 1940s to an enduring American institution by the 1970s. She provides the first historical examination of the people, policies, and systems that made the United States an enduring "adoption nation."

Daughter from Afar

Daughter from Afar PDF Author: Sarah Lynn Woodard
Publisher: iUniverse
ISBN: 0595245439
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 146

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Book Description
An adoptive mother shares her true story about the sadness and joys of the long process to adopt an abandoned Chinese baby girl. Sarah Woodard reveals with humor, sensitivity and honesty the adoption process, the journey to bring home her daughter and the ultimate adventure of becoming a mother. It is an absorbing story, beautifully written, in which two different cultures combine and illuminate each other, culminating in a heart-warming ending. But, as this new family is being born, it is really only the beginning.

Mishka

Mishka PDF Author: Adrienne Ehlert Bashista
Publisher: Drt Press
ISBN: 9781933084015
Category : Adoption
Languages : en
Pages : 0

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Book Description
A mother talks to her child about what life was like before the child was adopted from Russia, and what life is like now.

Global Families

Global Families PDF Author: Catherine Ceniza Choy
Publisher: NYU Press
ISBN: 1479891169
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 246

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Book Description
In the last fifty years, transnational adoption—specifically, the adoption of Asian children—has exploded in popularity as an alternative path to family making. Despite the cultural acceptance of this practice, surprisingly little attention has been paid to the factors that allowed Asian international adoption to flourish. In Global Families, Catherine Ceniza Choy unearths the little-known historical origins of Asian international adoption in the United States. Beginning with the post-World War II presence of the U.S. military in Asia, she reveals how mixed-race children born of Japanese, Korean, and Vietnamese women and U.S. servicemen comprised one of the earliest groups of adoptive children. Based on extensive archival research, Global Families moves beyond one-dimensional portrayals of Asian international adoption as either a progressive form of U.S. multiculturalism or as an exploitative form of cultural and economic imperialism. Rather, Choy acknowledges the complexity of the phenomenon, illuminating both its radical possibilities of a world united across national, cultural, and racial divides through family formation and its strong potential for reinforcing the very racial and cultural hierarchies it sought to challenge.