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Objective: Existing psychosocial research offers little information on the unique challenges and strengths of children adopted from China with cleft lip and/or palate (CL/P). The present study aimed to understand biopsychosocial factors that support positive self-concept in this population. Design: Qualitative, semistructured interviews were conducted with children and their parents. Interpretive phenomenological analysis of transcribed interviews was utilized for data analysis. Setting: Participants were recruited in an outpatient, pediatric multidisciplinary cleft clinic during a standard team visit. Patients, Participants: Participants were ages 8 to 12 years with a diagnosis of isolated cleft lip-palate who were internationally adopted from China before the age of 2 years and English-speaking. Participants also included English-speaking parents. Results: Themes reflecting data from the child and parent subsamples include: (1) child's characteristics, (2) family strengths, (3) adoption identity, (4) cultural identity, (5) coping with a cleft, and (6) social factors. Additional 2 to 3 subthemes were identified for the parent and child subsamples within each broader theme. Conclusions: Findings from this sample suggested factors supporting positive self-concept included pride and self-efficacy in activities, family support, instilment of family values, strategies for coping with a cleft, family belonging, cultural exposure, and normalization of differences. Medical providers can support patients and families by providing education on surgeries, CL/P sequelae and outcomes, and pediatric medical stress. Mental health providers can screen for social and emotional challenges and provide psychoeducation on racial/ethnic socialization, identity development, and coping. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

An introduction is presented in which the editor discusses articles in the issue on topics including racial socialization and parenting in underrepresented families, including multiethnic, immigrant, and transracial adoptive families.

Objective: This study of transracially adopted adolescents and their White parents examines family cohesion and expressiveness as predictors of parents' engagement in cultural socialization and preparation for bias. It also examines differences in adolescent and parent views of the level of cohesion and expressiveness in their family. Background: Given the importance of both cultural socialization and preparation for bias on promoting the well‐being of adoptees, it is of value to examine why some White parents engage in these behaviors more frequently than others. Family functioning sets the tone for subsequent interactions and may be an important contributor to parents' racial socialization efforts. Method: Seventy‐two transracially adopted parent–adolescent dyads completed an online survey. Results: Generally, parents and adolescents reported high cohesion and moderate expressiveness, although transracially adopted adolescents tended to view their family more negatively than their parents. Parents who viewed their family as more cohesive and expressive were more likely to engage in cultural socialization. Those who viewed their family as more expressive were more likely to talk to their child about race and prepare them for discrimination. Contrary to expectation, when adolescents viewed their family as less expressive, their parents were more likely to engage in preparation for bias. Conclusion and Implications: The importance of including multiple family members' perspectives to more fully understand transracial adoptive families and the need for White parents to engage in quality, not just frequent, racial socialization are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background and Purpose: To translate and validate the influenza vaccination acceptance (MoVac-flu) and vaccination advocacy (MoV-ad) scales, in a sample of Greek health professionals (HPs). Methods: A cross-sectional study was conducted in eight representative secondary hospitals in Greece. A total of 296 HPs were administered the scales. Results: The internal consistency of the Gr-MoVac-flu and the Gr-MoV-ad scale was high, and Cronbach's alpha was.92 for each scale. The Gr-MoVac-flu and the Gr-MoV-ad scales are not unidimensional and demonstrated two-factor structures respectively. Conclusions: The MoVac-flu and the MoV-ad scale are highly convergent validity tools that could provide rich understanding of HPs' decision to uptake and to advocate for vaccination. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Part 2 of this article presents a reading of three films—first, The Blind Side (2009) about the interracial adoption of a Black teenager by a White upper-middle class family, second, The Kids Are All Right (2009) about a middle-class lesbian marriage, and third, The Normal Heart (2012) about gay activism during the HIV/AIDS epidemic. The first two films are mainstream and as such dramatize and cultivate empathy in ways that reinforce hegemonic (White, middle-class, and heteronormative) expectations. The Normal Heart contrasts with these films, and does so despite its homonormative focus on White gay men, in that The Normal Heart allows viewers to consider ways of resisting expected emotional responses. However, all three films illustrate the failure of Paul Bloom's argument in Against Empathy to consider the enculturation of affect, which is quite typical of social psychology. We are, as Althusser puts it, "interpellated" by normative ideology and hegemonic representations; and film clearly demonstrates this point. Only psychoanalysis—in this article, the school of Lacan and Lacanian film theory—allows us to read unconscious dynamics in relation to coercive enculturation and identify resistant cultural representations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This qualitative study explored the experiences of transracial Korean adoptee returnees who were born in Korea, separated from their biological families, raised in the United States and three European countries by White families, and given an Anglicized or Germanic name at the time of their adoption. This study focused on participants' journeys of reclaiming their Korean birth names and the various influences that factored into this decision. Data were collected from in-depth, semi-structured interviews (in-person or via Skype) and coded using grounded-theory methods that integrated a constructivist-interpretivist and critical epistemological paradigm. Participants (N = 12) were transracial Korean adoptees with ages ranging from 22 to 42 years (M = 32.67 years) who were between 0 and 88 months (M = 22.33 months) at the time of adoption, all of whom had returned to Korea. Results from the interviews revealed 11 axial categories and 2 overarching selective categories related to the name reclamation process: (a) name reclamation was part of a larger identity development process; (b) factors that prevented or slowed the name reclamation process. Limitations and future areas of research are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Adopted youth often do not achieve in school as well as their non-adopted peers. We used data from the High School Longitudinal Study to examine high school and postsecondary achievement outcomes in adopted youth. We compared outcomes for domestically adopted youth, internationally adopted youth, and non-adopted youth. Results indicate that domestically adopted youth have lower grade point averages. Internationally adopted youth were less likely to enroll in four-year postsecondary institutions than were non-adopted youth. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this qualitative study the researchers interviewed 17 adult transnational Colombian adoptees in reunion with their Colombian first families. Through thematic analysis methodology three themes emerged: (1) first family influences, (2) navigating between families, and (3) identity reclamation. Participants in the study described the impact reunion had on their perceptions of family and their identities. The Competencies for Working with Transracial Adoptees and the Transracial Adoption Kinship Network (TrAKN) served as a framework to discuss implications for adoptees and family counselors. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Family communication scholarship on transnational adoption has privileged adoptive family communication, in part, because only a fraction of transnational adoptees have been able to locate birth relatives. Given increased global access to DNA testing and more advanced technologies, reunions between transnational adoptees and birth families are increasing. Informed by our positionalities as an adoptive mother of a child born in China and a Korean adult adoptee in reunion with her birth family, we set an agenda for family communication research in the context of transnational adoption birth family search and reunion. We raise three questions for consideration in future family communication research on this topic: (a) Whose history is this?, (b) Whose search is this?, and (c) Whose culture is this? This agenda privileges theories and constructs promising for answering these questions, including communication privacy management theory, family communication patterns theory, adoptive identity, ambiguous loss, and culture and communication. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose: Transracial adoption (TRA), where parents from one race adopt a child from another race, usually occurs with Black children being adopted by White parents in South Africa.Using multiple case studies (seven children) and a qualitative research design, the self-identity (personal and social) of six- to ten-year-old TRA children was explored. Data were collected from the adoptive parents and teachers by means of semi-structured interviews and the Child Behaviour Checklist. Additionally, parents completed a questionnaire and a Likert-style response scale. Participating children were assessed by an independent psychologist using three projective techniques. The data generated were thematically analysed.There were six emergent themes, all conducive to healthy self-identity development by securing primary identity motivators of belonging and acceptance. The children exhibited advanced communicative skills and a novel approach to group membership, increasing their social accessibility and inclusion. A distinctive theme was a desire for a dedicated personal space and possessions symbolizing permanence in the family. The universal adoptive elements of loss and rejection was confirmed, possibly more prevalent due to an observable adoptive status and physical dissimilarity from the adoptive family. Intentional parenting promoting healthy self-identity was apparent. Lastly, the importance of placing the children in an accommodating and sensitive school environment was noted.While not a comparative study, and with only seven children, it appears that these TRA children, with the acquisition of positive social skills and a sensitive and purposeful home and school environment, possessed the building blocks necessary to nurture a healthy self-identity.Method: Transracial adoption (TRA), where parents from one race adopt a child from another race, usually occurs with Black children being adopted by White parents in South Africa.Using multiple case studies (seven children) and a qualitative research design, the self-identity (personal and social) of six- to ten-year-old TRA children was explored. Data were collected from the adoptive parents and teachers by means of semi-structured interviews and the Child Behaviour Checklist. Additionally, parents completed a questionnaire and a Likert-style response scale. Participating children were assessed by an independent psychologist using three projective techniques. The data generated were thematically analysed.There were six emergent themes, all conducive to healthy self-identity development by securing primary identity motivators of belonging and acceptance. The children exhibited advanced communicative skills and a novel approach to group membership, increasing their social accessibility and inclusion. A distinctive theme was a desire for a dedicated personal space and possessions symbolizing permanence in the family. The universal adoptive elements of loss and rejection was confirmed, possibly more prevalent due to an observable adoptive status and physical dissimilarity from the adoptive family. Intentional parenting promoting healthy self-identity was apparent. Lastly, the importance of placing the children in an accommodating and sensitive school environment was noted.While not a comparative study, and with only seven children, it appears that these TRA children, with the acquisition of positive social skills and a sensitive and purposeful home and school environment, possessed the building blocks necessary to nurture a healthy self-identity.Results: Transracial adoption (TRA), where parents from one race adopt a child from another race, usually occurs with Black children being adopted by White parents in South Africa.Using multiple case studies (seven children) and a qualitative research design, the self-identity (personal and social) of six- to ten-year-old TRA children was explored. Data were collected from the adoptive parents and teachers by means of semi-structured interviews and the Child Behaviour Checklist. Additionally, parents completed a questionnaire and a Likert-style response scale. Participating children were assessed by an independent psychologist using three projective techniques. The data generated were thematically analysed.There were six emergent themes, all conducive to healthy self-identity development by securing primary identity motivators of belonging and acceptance. The children exhibited advanced communicative skills and a novel approach to group membership, increasing their social accessibility and inclusion. A distinctive theme was a desire for a dedicated personal space and possessions symbolizing permanence in the family. The universal adoptive elements of loss and rejection was confirmed, possibly more prevalent due to an observable adoptive status and physical dissimilarity from the adoptive family. Intentional parenting promoting healthy self-identity was apparent. Lastly, the importance of placing the children in an accommodating and sensitive school environment was noted.While not a comparative study, and with only seven children, it appears that these TRA children, with the acquisition of positive social skills and a sensitive and purposeful home and school environment, possessed the building blocks necessary to nurture a healthy self-identity.Discussion: Transracial adoption (TRA), where parents from one race adopt a child from another race, usually occurs with Black children being adopted by White parents in South Africa.Using multiple case studies (seven children) and a qualitative research design, the self-identity (personal and social) of six- to ten-year-old TRA children was explored. Data were collected from the adoptive parents and teachers by means of semi-structured interviews and the Child Behaviour Checklist. Additionally, parents completed a questionnaire and a Likert-style response scale. Participating children were assessed by an independent psychologist using three projective techniques. The data generated were thematically analysed.There were six emergent themes, all conducive to healthy self-identity development by securing primary identity motivators of belonging and acceptance. The children exhibited advanced communicative skills and a novel approach to group membership, increasing their social accessibility and inclusion. A distinctive theme was a desire for a dedicated personal space and possessions symbolizing permanence in the family. The universal adoptive elements of loss and rejection was confirmed, possibly more prevalent due to an observable adoptive status and physical dissimilarity from the adoptive family. Intentional parenting promoting healthy self-identity was apparent. Lastly, the importance of placing the children in an accommodating and sensitive school environment was noted.While not a comparative study, and with only seven children, it appears that these TRA children, with the acquisition of positive social skills and a sensitive and purposeful home and school environment, possessed the building blocks necessary to nurture a healthy self-identity. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In a dynamic term of the United States Supreme Court in 2021-2022 a series of critical cases raise manifold changes and impacts on individual and communal health through 10 key areas ranging from abortions to vaccinations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Basic biology tells us that each child has no more than two biological parents, one who supplies the egg and one who supplies the sperm. Adoption law in this country has generally followed biology, insisting only two parents be legally recognized for each child. Thus, every adoption begins with loss. Before a child can be adopted, that child must first be cut off from their family of birth, rendering the equation of adoption one of subtraction, not addition. This Article examines the biological model of adoption that insists on mimicking the nuclear family--erasing one set of parents and replacing them with another set of parents, and explores the history of adoption "matching"--requiring the new adoptive family to look identical to a biological family. But changes in family formation, to include same-sex adoption and transracial adoption, make conceivable other departures from biologically justified parenting, including legal recognition of more than two parents. This Article argues that an additive, rather than subtractive, model of adoption should prevail. In light of what we know from psychological literature about the importance of family connections in adoption and based on different adoption structures in France and other parts of the world, the Article also explores some of the trepidation about more than two parents, including the potential for conflict among multiple parents, and suggests solutions to ameliorate some of those concerns. Families that were once inconceivable are now flourishing; legal recognition of more than two parents should follow. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

For much of the twentieth century unmarried motherhood caused considerable anxiety in Ireland, as it did in many other countries. The Commission understood this evidence as "stories", with witnesses considered unreliable in their testimony. The range of archives looked at by the Commission is found in volume 6. There were two arms to the Commission, a "confidential committee" where former residents and staff could provide accounts of their experiences, and an investigation committee. [Extracted from the article]

Adoptive families must navigate public discourse about adoption. This study examined how transracial adoptive (TRA) and same-race adoptive (SRA) families communicated to their children through internal boundary management, teaching external boundary management strategies, and preparation for bias as ways to address adoption microaggressions (AMAs). 104 U.S. adoptive parents (TRA = 77; SRA = 27) completed a survey about their communication about four types of AMA situations (i.e., Lucky, Destiny, "Deficient" Birth Parents, Search). What parents directly communicated to the child to address these AMAs and links to what parents thought of AMAs were explored. Nine themes emerged within parents' communication reflecting different uses of internal boundary management, teaching external boundary management, and preparation for bias strategies. Findings illuminated the complexities in parents' direct communication involving nuanced messages to adopted children about navigating AMAs. Enhanced education and training for adoptive parents can improve their understanding and ability to help children who are adopted address adoption bias. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The trope of interracial adoption is complex but fairly common in American literature, particularly as it results in the racist and racialized hallmark of displacing and depicting Black women as bad Black mothers--the antithesis of White maternity. This essay posits the trope's genesis at the center of abolitionist writer Harriet Beecher Stowe's extraordinarily influential anti-slavery novel, Uncle Tom's Cabin. The novel has been heralded as the most significant literary accomplishment by an American writer, both nationally and internationally, during the nineteenth century. Notwithstanding, Stowe's novel sets in motion the cultural ideology that Whiteness--in the form of adoption by a free, White, Christian mother / savior--is a direct route out of bondage for enslaved Black children. Necessarily and in direct response, Harriet E. Wilson's autobiographical novel, Our Nig, and Frances Ellen Watkins Harper's poem, "Moses: A Story of the Nile," bring the complicated anti-Black and White constructions of power, motherhood, consanguinity, and kinship into sharp relief. Taken together, their writings form an episodic and polyscopic perspective on belonging, bondage, freedom, and agency. Most importantly, Wilson's and Harper's texts amplify the historical remainder of and tension between ways of understanding racialized adoption and insist that the literary (human) being that is the Black mother be made legible. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Transracial adoption is a relatively new and controversial practice in South Africa. We undertook a systematic review of empirical research by adhering to the preferred reporting items for systematic reviews and meta-analyses guideline. A comprehensive literature search was conducted on research, both peer-reviewed and unpublished academic work, between January 1991 and April 2021. We report on the scientific nature, rigour, quality and scope of studies of the items found and outline the themes which emerge from the empirical research. These include attitudes towards transracial adoption, the experiences of adoptive parents and transracial adoptees as well as recommendations for practice. Different theoretical paradigms, variable methodology, small sample sizes of poorly defined target groups impact negatively on comparability and generalisability of results. This research fails to engage with the specificities that might impact on successful outcomes for transracially adopted families and guide professional practice including post-adoption support. Developing this research field will require large-scale studies on the outcomes for transracial adoptees and adoptive families, and research using the comparable methodology and theoretical frameworks. Such research can guide local policies and practices in South Africa and will enhance the international research into transracial adoption. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This conversation between artist Lisa Wool-Rim Sjöblom and anthropologist and adoption scholar Eleana J. Kim discusses the US Supreme Court decision in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization in the context of transnational, transracial adoption. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this personal essay, the author describes a story of the loss, lifelong grief, and repercussions experienced by all members of the adoption triad. This story counters the frequently told fairytale narrative that posits the promises of adoption over abortion as a solution to “unwanted” pregnancies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article, titled "Transracial adoption, identity, and racism in the United States: Between two worlds," is written by Kyrai E. Antares, a licensed psychologist and White adoptive mother of a mixed-race and White child. Antares presents journal and interview testimonials from nine Black transracial adoptees (TRAs) aged 18-28, who were raised by midwestern families in the United States. The author explores the impacts of transracial adoption on TRAs' identity development, highlighting barriers such as conflicting racial lenses, lack of exposure to their own racial and cultural background, and the "colorblind" mentality embraced by some families. Antares also discusses the impact of the White racial lens and systematic racism, and provides advice for parents and professionals to support Black TRAs' racial and cultural development. The book offers insights and encourages openness, but some readers may find the criticisms of White TRA parents uncomfortable. [Extracted from the article]

To gain insight into ethnic socialization by ethnic majority foster parents who take care of ethnic minority foster youth, we conducted a comparative dyadic analysis, based on 16 foster parent‐foster youth dyads. Outcomes show that foster parents' first concern was providing a safe environment for their foster youth, and not ethnic minority socialization. Foster parents seem to strive to belong together as one family with their foster youth. As part of those efforts, they would incorporate ethnicity differences, and/or struggles with how to address them. This occurred in a reciprocal socialization process with their foster youth. Next, although foster youth could experience discrimination, there seems to exist a relative silence about this issue in foster families. Results furthermore show that birth parents may play a role as connectors with the ethnic backgrounds of the foster youth. Foster parents may need guidance by foster care agencies in learning how to address ethnicity issues openly, teaching their foster youth how to survive in a society where ethnic minority discrimination occurs, and involving birth parents in the ethnic socialization of the youth. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In 2018, the Ethiopian Parliament closed its intercountry adoption program. Momentum to end the program followed reports of adoption-related exploitation including the abduction and sale of children, falsification of documentation, bribing of officials, inaccurate testimonies, and false promises to birth families. The Ethiopian Parliament also cited concerns over the identity and psychological problems of adoptees as contributing factors to the ban. This paper explores how adoptive parents, with knowledge of exploitation in their own adoptions, are responding emotionally and pragmatically. Qualitative analysis of interview data provides insight into how adoptive parents communicate about and integrate referral and emergent adoption narratives in the service of healthy identity development in adopted children. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The safety concerns for autonomous vehicles (AV) are shown to be a roadblock to their adoption. This paper addresses these concerns by studying a unified, game-theoretic framework (leader–follower game) of mixed traffic in which AVs and human-driven vehicles (HV) coexist, with endogenous vehicle demand and different types of accidents emerging in mixed traffic as crucial building blocks. We study the interaction between three types of players: (i) a policymaker, who decides on the liability regime and the level of V2I connectivity infrastructure, (ii) an AV producer, who decides on the AV price and safety level, and (iii) consumers, who differ in their preference for each vehicle type and choose the one they like best. Using both analytical and numerical tools, we analyze how the two policy variables, liability and V2I connectivity, affect behavior on the demand and supply side of the vehicle market and, in turn, AV market penetration and overall road safety. We also characterize optimal policies, thereby taking into account the market participants' behavioral responses. Our findings provide guidance for a fast adoption of AVs and a smooth transition from existing traffic conditions to a mixed traffic environment, and assist in decision making for policymakers, legal agencies, traffic operation and transportation planning agencies, as well as car manufacturers. • Game-theoretic framework of mixed traffic with autonomous and human-driven vehicles • Endogenous AV demand and interaction between policymaker, AV producer and consumers • Focus on (product) liability and V2I connectivity as key policy variables • A higher level of AV safety might reduce the demand for AVs • Stringent AV liability induces high safety investment but low AV market penetration [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Ethnic minority foster children are frequently placed in families with ethnic majority backgrounds. In the international literature these placements are most commonly called transracial placements. Aims: With this study, we aim to obtain an encompassing view of the empirical scientific literature on how transracial placements may affect the ethnic identity of foster children. Materials and methods: To gain insight into the ethnic identity of transracially placed foster children and the way they are ethnically socialized, we conducted a systematic literature review. We thereby followed the guidelines of the PRISMA statement. Results: Transracially placed foster children may experience higher fluctuations in their racial/ ethnic identity over time than adolescents with a minority background in the general population. They also seem to be prone to experience disconnection from, or on the contrary, connection with the birth network; and some transracially placed foster children struggle with societal messages they receive about minority ethnicity and race. They may have an increased awareness of their minority ethnic background because of different physical appearances between themselves and the foster family. Foster parents can play a pivotal role in these processes, since culturally competent foster parents may guide foster children in their ethnic identity development by being open towards children's cultural minority background as well as being self‐reflective regarding their own cultural values and beliefs. Discussion: The ethnic development of transracially placed foster children seems to be influenced by intersecting mechanisms of being in foster care and having a minority ethnicity. Although the selected articles assume that foster parents impact the ethnic identities of their ethnic minority foster children, none of them measured the impact of foster parents' skills and knowledge on foster children' s ethnic identity development directly. Conclusion: Being transracially placed impacts the ethnic identity of foster children. Foster parents need to be cultural competent to encourage their foster children's ethnic identity development. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Nathaniel Hawthorne's The Scarlet Letter has generated numerous adaptations. Its depiction of race has made it a problematic 'master text', however, especially since it was published in the same year as the US Fugitive Slave Act. This essay examines three recent adaptations across a variety of media that focus on the relationship between race and motherhood, revealing the ways in which Hester Prynne can be integrated into society as a single mother in ways that non-white mothers cannot. Suzan-Lori Parks' 1998 play In the Blood stages 'Hester, La Negrita' as a homeless mother of five who cannot escape the 'hand of fate' of racial oppression. Celeste Ng's 2017 novel Little Fires Everywhere reinvents Hester as a surrogate mother whose efforts on behalf of a birth mother in a trans-racial adoption dispute highlight how race differentially impacts maternal rights. The 2020 Hulu television adaptation of Ng's novel casts the Hester and Pearl figures, along with an artist named Hawthorne, as black women whose activism forces the Richardson family to acknowledge their white privilege. Together, these adaptations examine how the 'monstrous birth' of slavery that Hawthorne only belatedly acknowledged has had a lingering afterlife in constructions of race and motherhood. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper sets out to investigate interracial adoption narratives in children's picture books and explores how these narratives are constructed through the combined use of verbal and visual metaphors. The study examines a selection of six picture books published in the U.S.A. over the last few years and targeting a readership between the ages of four and eight. Interracial adoption books can help youngsters make sense of their reality and can be relied upon to initiate family conversations about difficult topics such as the lack of genetic bond and resemblance between parents and children. Since metaphors involve talking about one thing in terms of another, they can be strategically used in picture books to make complex concepts accessible to young readers. The study identifies the main metaphorical configurations of interracial adoption discourses in children's books by means of a hybrid methodological toolkit that integrates the approaches of Critical Discourse Analysis, Critical Metaphor Analysis and Multimodal Metaphor Studies. Findings suggest that narratives about interracial adoption are positively biased and often contain oversimplifications or inaccurate descriptions of adoptees' life situations; while these stories aim to offer children reassuring answers about complicated issues such as identity and ethnicity, they frequently fail to provide validation for adoptees' ambivalent feelings towards their new situations and families. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Transracial adoption (TRA) has been practised and researched in wealthy industrialized countries for decades, but there is limited literature about this practice in low- and middle-income countries like South Africa, where it is an uncommon and relatively new practice. Transracial adoption is heavily influenced by the context in which it occurs. Particular contextual features make South Africa well placed to showcase a different form of transracial adoption. This paper starts filling in the gap in the international literature by outlining historical, socio-economic and cultural features that influence the practice of transracial adoption and the experiences of transracial adoptive families in South Africa. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Transracial adoption (TRA) in South Africa is a relatively young practice due to the legacy of Apartheid and continued racial segregation. As such, little research has explored TRA family experiences in South Africa. Experts worldwide agree that TRA parents need to engage their children in racial and cultural socialization. To explore parental attitudes toward the cultural and racial socialization of their TRA children, this study adopted a mixed-method approach. First, 76 TRA parents completed the Transracial Adoption Parenting Scale. Second, using Vonk's (2001) three-part definition of TRA parent cultural competence, 35 TRA parents were interviewed regarding their racial awareness, multicultural planning, and imparting of survival skills to their adopted children. Findings are discussed along with implications for educating potential TRA parents of the importance of racial/cultural socialization of transracial adoptees. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Transracially adopted children and adolescents are subject to increased risks to their mental health and identity development as a result of racism and microaggressions. The risks are exacerbated by limited racial–ethnic socialization from their mostly White adoptive parents. This article reviews the history of transracial adoption in the United States through the lens of colonization, describes research related to racism and its impact on transracially adopted children, and recommends relational–cultural theory as a supportive framework for school, mental health, and family counselors. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Parents (N = 166) in transracial, international adoptive (TIA) families with children from China or Vietnam were surveyed to investigate their experiences with privacy turbulence surrounding the family’s private, adoptionrelated information. About half described at least one instance of privacy turbulence, with a total of 98 instances. The instances included examples of all six types of privacy turbulence described in Communication Privacy Management theory, but two of those types, namely boundary rule mistakes and boundary definition predicaments, accounted for 90% of the instances of turbulence. Evidence of explicit rules and catalyst criteria for rule formation in the turbulence descriptions suggest ways that TIA parents might be able to avoid or manage privacy turbulence. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The potential of interracial, interreligious, and intercultural mixing—that is, cultural hybridity—was a frequent source of anxiety in the literature of sixteenth-century England. Following the start of the Tudor conquest of Ireland, contemporary writers and makers of Anglo-Irish policy emphasized that Irish culture, especially its language, laws, and customs, was seen as debilitating to English hegemony and demanded eradication. This article examines Tudor attitudes toward colonialization and cultural hybridity in two texts, Thomas More’s Utopia (1516) and Edmund Spenser’s A View of the Present State of Ireland (1596), each of which focus on the position of one product of cultural intermarriage, the hybrid child. Through an interrogation of both More’s portrayal of an idealized aftermath of colonial enterprise and Spenser’s genocidal fantasy of English imperialism in Ireland, I argue that cultural hybridity is simultaneously rendered integral and dangerous to the former and inherently destructive to the latter due to the ontological liminality of the hybrid child. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article discusses (pre-)adoption narratives by investigating a selection of children's picture books featuring multi-ethnic families. The research examines both textual and pictorial resources, focusing specifically on the use of metaphors as a tool of cognition which may help an audience of young readers understand and become acquainted with unfamiliar notions connected to the process of interracial adoption. Attention is also devoted to the identification, interpretation, and explanation of recurring metaphors in the books as a means of framing (pre-)adoption experiences, i.e. foregrounding certain aspects of the target domains and backgrounding others. The analysis has revealed an almost ubiquitous presence of the journey metaphor in the sample of books. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Famous for adopting twelve children, most of them children of color, Helen Doss used her transracially adoptive family to model white racial liberal values. The Family Nobody Wanted argues for white social responsibility for addressing racial discrimination, framed by sentimental anecdotes about her harmonious multiracial home. Focusing on the national and racial ideology of the 1940s, when most of the adoptions were completed, this essay calls attention to the domestic conditions that led to Doss's public prominence and the interconnections between white racial liberalism's emphasis on civic duty and the rise of adoptive parents as important civic actors. These developments, traced through Doss's autobiography, demonstrate the mechanisms by which white civic responsibility became attached to the act of transracial adoption, with implications for how white adopters are perceived today--often as experts in transracial adoption experiences whose views are privileged above other participants in the adoption system. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose: This paper introduces the concept of transracial aesthetic labour to understand why and how an international teaching assistant (ITA) vocally changes meanings of his racial identity. Design/methodology/approach: The paper uses a narrative analysis to detail instances of transracial aesthetic labour. Findings: For the ITA, this labour involved orally distancing from or aligning with particular Indian stereotypes for specific contexts. Research limitations/implications: Transracial aesthetic labour may occur in other industries that deem race an integral part of sounding right or looking good for the job. Practical implications: The findings highlight the need for ITAs and universities to rethink the meaning of transracial to combat racist perceptions of ITAs' speech. Originality/value: The paper advances the aesthetic labour literature by exploring how race is vocally performed for this labour and introducing ITAs as aesthetic labourers. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The safeguards and measures to prevent child trafficking mentioned in the 1993 Hague Convention on Intercountry Adoption have proven insufficient in curbing the so-called irregular adoptions. An analysis of how Spanish central authorities and intermediary agencies managed the flow of adoption dossiers between 2003 and 2013 presents their inability to react swiftly to the imbalance between adoption demand and supply. The 2015 reforms in the Spanish law introduced measures to bring demand in line with real needs. However, imaginaries that portray adopters and children from the Global South as victims of meaningless bureaucracy continue to hold true even today. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

With growing global emergencies, child abduction became a concern in countries of origin and reception of transnationally adopted children. Improved regulations and standards to prevent child trafficking exhibit failures to ensure the best interest of children and the principle of subsidiarity. The article reviews relevant literature documents the Guatemalan birthmothers' experiences and documented child theft, deception by trafficking networks, fraudulent adoptions, and familial coercion. Human rights and child welfare system implications drawn may be relevant to irregular transnational adoptions elsewhere. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A growing movement of illegally adopted individuals request remedies and reparations for the human rights violations that they and their biological families had suffered. This article explores a number of measures that the stakeholders in the receiving countries can use in an effort to repair the human rights violations caused by illegal intercountry adoptions, borrowing ideas from transitional justice. In order to effectively redress the harm inflicted upon victims of illegal adoptions, a policy on remedies should combine instruments of retributive justice, aimed at holding wrongdoers accountable, with measures of restorative justice that focus on the victims' needs and interests. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Despite closing a legal guardianship loophole that enabled foreign prospective adoptive parents to bypass restrictive Ugandan adoption laws in 2016, corruption in intercountry adoption persisted, with the courts legitimating new end-runs around the requirements. But US sanctions issued in 2020 bring new hope for reform. By highlighting what children's advocates are doing to fight back, I suggest strategies for effective child and family safeguarding practices against adoption corruption as well as efforts to seek justice for affected children and families. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

As families in the United States (U.S.) are increasingly diverse in race and family structure, it is essential to understand family socialization around identity and possible associations with family relationships and child development. In this study, we investigated adoption communicative openness (i.e., how parents talk about adoption) and racial/cultural socialization among 96 adoptive families (46% completed transracial adoption) with lesbian, gay, and heterosexual parents and school-age children (Mage = 8 years) who lived across the U.S. We found that these practices (described by parents) were associated with children's reports of parent-child relationships and children's teachers reports of their academic functioning. We discuss the importance of considering distinct forms of identity socialization practices, as reported by different informants, among adoptive families diverse in race and parental sexual orientation, and as related to associations with individual outcomes and family relationships. We describe how our results could inform future research, policy, and practice. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]