When celebrities like Madonna and Angelina Jolie adopted their children from other countries, transnational and interracial adoption became instant buzzwords around the world. Suddenly the concept of the only family structure I had ever known — having been adopted as an infant — was being dissected in gossip magazines. People made adoption out to be something of a trend or passing fad.
In reality, international adoption dates back to the Korean War, when white American families (mostly from Minnesota) began taking war orphans into their homes and raising them.
Two years ago, I enrolled in the first known college course about international adoption called “Cultures of Korean Adoption.” About half the class was made up of Korean adoptees, and the class was taught by a Korean adoptee who was doing her Ph.D. work in the area of Korean adoption.
Most of the other adoptees in my class had very different experiences growing up than I had. Certainly the writers of the memoirs we read had very different experiences, having grown up a generation or two before us. In the 1970s, Korean adoptees seemed to be few and far between. Resources like Korean culture camp, language villages and dance groups didn’t exist for adoptees and their families. Schools didn’t offer counseling groups for adopted students. Agencies didn’t encourage parents to introduce their children to their native cultures.
I grew up in Minnesota, the so-called Korean adoptee capital of the world. An estimated 10,000 to 15,000 adoptees currently live in Minnesota. I met my first Korean adopted friend when I was in first grade and went to Korean culture camp for the first time when I was 8. I went to Korean school on Saturday mornings for a year and performed Korean dance for eight years. Our dance group was mostly adoptees, including our teacher.
From fifth grade all the way to college, I had adopted friends and an adopted role model. I had a support network that understood that sometimes I felt out of place in my own family and that knew it felt weird to be the only Asian kid in a class at school.
Last fall, a group of adoptees, myself included, came together to form a student group for Korean adoptees. Many local adoptee elders praised us for banding together. “I wish we had something like this when I was in school,” they said.
Unfortunately, our little group later disbanded. I believe this is because so many of us grew up here, and we didn’t need a formal reason to come together. There’s a sort of loose adoptee network in place through summer culture camps and language villages, dance groups and Korean classes.
The adoptees who grew up in the generation before us seemed to come together as adults, finding one another for the first time. For us, we grew up with adoption as a much different part of our lives.
I still see my Korean adoptee friends, either in language class or out on the weekends. My adoption is very much a part of my life. I feel the duality of my identity every day, whether it’s a debate in our newsroom about coverage of minorities or something as simple as choosing rice or pasta for dinner.
It’s unlikely that I’ll ever be fluent in Korean, a fact that seems to drive my Korean birth family a little crazy. I probably will never live in Korea, because it’s a culture I feel so disconnected from. But it’s also unlikely that I’ll ever lose my connection to the adoptee culture, one which I firmly believe exists. It’s a culture of conflict, loss, identity, tragedy and confusion, but it’s mine and I’m okay with owning that.
“It’s also unlikely that I’ll ever lose my connection to the adoptee culture, one which I firmly believe exists. It’s a
culture of conflict, loss, identity, tragedy and confusion,
but it’s mine.”
Emma Carew is a junior at the University of Minnesota majoring in journalism. This story was originally posted on the AZN Television community forum, Outspoken (azntv.com/outspoken).