Archive

A fight to change adoption law
By Shannon Heit
The Korea Herald 2009.11.13
Leveraging the help of a group of lawyers and a Korean unwed mothers organization, a group of expats in Seoul are driving a movement to create a major shift in how the country deals with adoptions.
With the support of Democratic Party Representative Choi Young-hee, this coalition presented its bill to revise the current Special Act Relating to Adoption Promotion and Procedure law at a National Assembly public hearing on Nov. 10.
The coalition has been working together for over a year to draw up a proposal for a new adoption law. Involved are three adoption-related groups - Truth and Reconciliation for the Adoptee Community of Korea (TRACK), Adoptee Solidarity Korea, KoRoot - an unwed mothers group, Miss Mama Mia, and the Gonggam Public Interest Lawyers Group.
What initially began last year as a request to the Anti-corruption and Civil Rights Commission for a probe into cases of allegedly inaccurate or falsified adoption records has expanded into a movement that could change the course of Koreas adoption program.

Adoption Mosaic
The Constellation
Fall 2008 Newsletter
Kim Park Nelson
Interview by Livia Montana
Livia Montana: You’re working on an oral history project with Korean adopted adults. How did you get interested in the project?
Kim Park Nelson: I’d been thinking about it for quite a long time, but I actually started it in 2002 as my Ph.D. dissertation project. I’d seen research that was supposed to be about adoptees but that didn’t really take adoptees’ voices into account. For instance, there’s a lot of adoption-related social work research where researchers would ask parents about their kids. Those answers were then used to represent the point of view of adoptees. Of course that’s not actually the point of view of adoptees, that’s the point of view of adoptive parents. So my initial intent was to work on a project that focused on the experiences of Korean adoptees.

JoongAng Daily
October 29, 2008
Searching for the holy grail amid the ruins of war
[Perspective]
With the won’s tailspin causing much expat distress these days, and with the “worst of the panic” clearly not over (despite what you may have read in my last column), I decided to stick to a good, old-fashioned inspirational story this week.
As such, it was very lucky that I happened to meet Misty Ann Edgecomb, a journalist from Maine in the United States. She came here in late September on a Fulbright grant to research just such a story - an account of what she says is the first international adoption of a Korean child by a single parent.
It begins when Edgecomb’s then 24-year-old grandfather-in-law, Paul Raynor, arrives in Seoul during the Korean War as a U.S. soldier.

Information, Danish newspaper
Lørdag 24. maj 2008 (2008.5.24)
MED ANDRE ØJNE
Red en voksen, køb en spæd kineser
Den lave fertilitetsrate i de vestlige lande er i dag den primære grund til, at nogle vælger at adoptere. Det danske adoptionsselskab AC Børnehjælp kunne i virkeligheden lige så godt hedde AC Voksenhjælp, siger Maja Lee Langvad, der selv er adopteret - og i øvrigt lesbisk
22. maj 2008
Af: KRISTINA NYA GLAFFEY

Information, Danish newspaper
16. juni 2008
Af: MAJA LEE LANGVAD
ADOPTION
International adoptioner en industri
Forskellen på adoptionsbranchen og andre brancher er, at der i adoptionsbranchen handles med mennesker. Men i og med, at det er en industri, har adoptionsselskaberne også en interesse i at fokusere på de gode historier
Information bragte den 23. maj en kronik af Anders Christensen (formand for adoptionsselskabet AC Børnehjælp) (AC) og Gitte Cordes (næstformand for AC Børnehjælp) (GC), som er bekymrede over den stigende kriminalitet i international adoption. AC og GC tegner et forsimplet billede, og deres forklaringer er kun overfladiske. Man må grave et spadestik dybere for at forstå dynamikken i international adoption og dermed også den voksende kriminalitet.

New York Times
Published: May 27, 2008
De-emphasis on Race in Adoption Is Criticized
By RON NIXON
WASHINGTON — Minority children in foster care are being ill-served by a federal law that plays down race and culture in adoptions, a report released on Tuesday said.
The report, based on an examination of the law's impact over a decade, said that minority children adopted into white households face special challenges and that white parents need preparation and training for what might lie ahead.
But it found that social workers and state agencies fear litigation and stiff penalties under the law for even discussing race with adopting couples. As a result, families often do not get the counseling they need. It also found that states have ignored an aspect of the law that requires diligent recruitment of black parents.

The New York Times
Published: October 8, 2008
Korea Aims to End Stigma of Adoption and Stop ‘Exporting’ Babies

By NORIMITSU ONISHI
SEOUL, South Korea — Daunted by the stigma surrounding adoption here, Cho Joong-bae and Kim In-soon delayed expanding their family for years. When they finally did six years ago, Mr. Cho chose to tell his elderly parents that the child was the result of an affair, rather than admit she was adopted.

Adopted From Korea and in Search of Identity
By RON NIXON
The New York Times
November 8, 2009
*See below for a link to the related study done by the Evan B. Donaldson Adoption Institute*
As a child, Kim Eun Mi Young hated being different.
When her father brought home toys, a record and a picture book on South Korea, the country from which she was adopted in 1961, she ignored them.

The Korea Herald
11.23.08
Am I American or am I Korean?
Following is Part I of a three part series on growing up adopted. Part II will be in tomorrows Expat Living. To comment, e-mail [email protected]. Richard Spalding can be reached through his blog www.inmyseoul.com - Ed.
My mothers favorite childhood story about me was when I paraded around the house with an American flag, playing Bruce Springsteens Born in the USA on my Playskool cassette player, and singing along at the top of my lungs. Ironically, this song was my favorite while I was growing up. It is ironic because I was not born in the USA.
I celebrate Oct. 20 as my birthday. I say celebrate because I do not know the exact date of my birth. The reason my parents dont know my birthday is because I was adopted from the Grace Orphanage in Daejeon, Korea, when I was about 5 years old. My adoptive parents had to assign a birthday to me for legal purposes, and they chose Oct. 20, 1980.
Yes, they even had to pick the year for my birthday.

Aired on KBS Thursday May 15, 2008
Link to Kim Sunee's KBS documentary:
http://www.kimsunee.com/video.html
- go to #3: KBS Documentary of Kim's Trip to Korea
Kim Sunee is the author of the memoir "Trail of Crumbs: Hunger, Love, and the Search for Home" published in January 2008. This documentary follows her from Birmingham to Korea.
www.kimsunee.com