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Chafins
Maggie Chafins

Professor Reynolds

ENG 1201.525

April 27, 2021

International Adoptees Living Between Two Cultures:

Why it Matters

Imagine, for just a moment, that you have been living with a wonderful family who loves

you so much and provides every opportunity for you. Now, imagine that, one day, you find a

box of paperwork that says you were adopted from another country, that the date of your birth

isn’t even known, and that the family with whom you have lived all these years isn’t even your

biological family. What is the first thing that comes to mind? Do you feel like you have been

deceived? Do you feel like you don’t even know who you are anymore? Do you now recognize

the many comments that have been made over the years about how you just don’t look that much

like your mom and dad? This is something that happens every day to kids all over the world.

Kids who have been “saved” from sometimes horrible situations in war torn and oppressive

countries or from orphanages that are overcrowded and underfunded wake up one day to

discover that they have a past, a culture, and family about whom they know absolutely nothing.

As one adoptee from Korea put it, “I went through life thinking I was similar to the kids I grew

up with. That I was White like them, not realizing that my adoption made me unlike them. I was

from a different country and a different race but still did not recognize for years that I was not

White” (Frette). Transnational and transracial adoption are relatively new concepts, and already

there have been conflicting opinions on the matter of raising children from other cultures and/or

races. In the past, it was assumed that a child should simply be integrated into their adoptive
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family’s culture and be raised just as if they were a birth child. However, there have more

recently been studies that seem to show that it is advantageous for the child to be made aware of

their whole history. Knowing where they came from and learning to maintain their identity can

help them truly grow into a well-adjusted adult. Adoptive parents of internationally adopted

children should strive to help their children maintain their cultural, racial and adoptive identities

by having open conversation, getting involved in multi-cultural activities and equipping them

with the necessary tools to deal with prejudice and discrimination.

Before exploring the necessary tools to equip the adoptees, we should first look at the

history of adoption in the United States. Before adoption became a legal term, orphaned or

abandoned children would be taken in by extended family or others. However, they did not have

the same rights that the biological children had. That changed in 1850 when Alabama passed a

law giving adopted children rights to inherit from their adoptive parents (Roberts). Now, at that

point, the concept of adoption became established, and it continues to evolve from there. World

War II brought a significant change to the world of adoption when the 1948 Displaced Persons

Act allowed 3,000 refugee orphans to come to American. The following year, Welcome House is

opened to promote the adoption of Asian American children (Roberts). That was the beginning

of transnational or international adoption. From that point, agencies are created to facilitate

adopting children from abroad, mainly Korean due to the Korean War. In addition, birth control

is approved and the number of available infants within the U.S. drops, leaving adoptive parents

to look to other countries for children that are ready to be adopted. The Hague Convention on

Intercountry Adoption was passed in 1993 with the purpose of bringing uniformity and

protection to the standards required to adopt internationally.

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There has been much done to legalize, legitimize and standardize the adoption of

children, both domestically and internationally, and the rights of the adoptees has taken a similar

path. In the beginning, adoptees were really just seen as indentured servants without any rights

at all. Between now and then, there have been several steps to protect children before, during

and after the adoption process. There are three

conventions that have made great strides in putting

the needs of the children as a top priority when

considering international. These include

the 1953 European Convention for the Protection

Figure 1The Internationally Known Adoption
of Human Rights and Symbol (Adoption Network).
Fundamental Freedoms, the

1990 United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child, and the 1993 Hague Adoption

Convention. One of the ideas that these conventions are trying to establish is that “Shedding the

culture of their family of origin and substituting that of their adopters involves begin stripped of

name, language, religion and culture which greatly compounds the usual problems for an adoptee

who wishes to trace their roots” (O’Halloran 20).

All of this paints a pretty grim picture of international adoption, but there is more to the

story. Many adoptees have stories of wonderful families who loved them, stuck by them and

made sure they had the best life possible. It is for that reason that international adoption

continues to evolve. While there is some evidence that international adoptions carried out

outside of the Hague Convention's guidelines is a form of human trafficking, there are also

many that are legal and diligently enacted. (Moffett). That is what we must continue to strive

for. The needs and rights of the child must be prioritized, and we must educate prospective

parents on how to help their adoptive children maintain their identity.

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We have looked at the history of adoption itself in the United States. Now we will look

at the way in which adoptive parents have been taught to handle bringing in a child from another

country, culture and religion. In France, there was a study done with 51 families to see what

strategies they have used to parent these international adoptees. There are three ways of

approaching the subject of bringing a child from one culture into a new culture, according to

this study (Harf). The first is to utilize what is referred to as Parental Colorblindness (Frette).

This is where the parents literally do not acknowledge the prior race, culture or religion of the

child. They simply assimilate the child into their culture, their religion and their race as if they

were born into that family. They do not share any history with the child, do not join in with other

adoptive families from the same country, and do not plan on returning to the country at any time.

The second would be to integrate some cultural things into family life. For instance, the family

could attend local festivals that focus on that culture, they could find recipes and make foods that

are popular in that culture or read books that speak to the culture, religion, or race. They don’t

really address racial issues or physical differences with the child and maintain more of a color-

blind attitude, like the first group. They are willing to share whatever history they have, but

don’t necessarily seek out any further information for the child. They tend to stay in contact with

other adoptive families. They do return to the country to visit. The third is an approach that

takes the child into consideration. The family will follow the child’s lead as they ask questions

and be completely open and honest with them. They accept their child’s feelings and assist them

in finding cultural belonging in both their culture of birth and their culture of adoption. They

also address the issue of race by teaching children that they will experience racism and prejudice

based on their differences and try to equip them for that. They not only share the child’s known

history, but they are willing to continue to seek more information as the child asks for it. They
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will stay in contact with other adoptive families. They stated that they were willing to return to

the country if the child wanted to, but not necessarily by their decision as the parent.

Initially, in almost all cases of international adoption, keeping the child’s history, culture,

religion and race from them was what was thought best. The intentions behind this were not bad

intentions. These were parents engaging in something that before had never been done. They

were bringing a child in from a whole other country, culture, religion and race and they just

wanted the child to feel like family. They thought they should teach the child that race doesn’t

matter and that this was their family. Most of them did not see that prejudice and racism would

ever be a problem. After all, this was their child, no different from them and shouldn’t be treated

as such. However, over the next decades, time has told that simply is not the case. The TAPS-R

study discussed in the next paragraph states that, “adoptive parents’ racial and cultural

socialization practices appear to be important for adoptees’ well-being and racial identity

development” (Lee).

Beginning in 2001, there was an instrument created to assist prospective adoptive parents

for the transracial/international adoption process. It was called Transracial Adoption Parenting

Scale, or TAPS (Lee). Recently, in 2016, the TAPS was revised to include international

adoption issues. A study was done to see if the revised TAPS was a reliable tool for adoptive

parenting in transracial and international adoption. The study looked at four factors: racial

awareness, multicultural planning, integration and coping skills (Lee). Researching how current

adoptive parents are choosing to racially and culturally socialize their children can serve to help

future adoptive parents best prepare their children. “Critics as well as supporters of the practice

of transracial adoption insist that TRA parents need to possess certain attitudes, knowledge, and

skills to help their children develop positive racial identities; a sense of belonging within their
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birth cultures; and the ability to successfully cope with racism or discrimination” (Lee). The tool

was a list of 47 questions pertaining to how a parent dealt with different things. For instance, did

they recognize the difficulties they would face before they chose to adopt internationally? Did

they have experience with others of the same race as their child? Now that they have adopted, do

they involve their family in activities that give consideration to the child’s race, religion or

culture? Have they provided opportunity for the child to learn the language of their culture?

Have they brought authority figures or role models of the same culture into their child’s life? Do

they live in a diverse community or allow their child to attend a diverse school? These questions

and their answers can help providers and agencies discern if a prospective adoptive couple is

ready for the challenge. If not, can some of these things be taught through classes to help the

prospective parent better serve their future adopted child? Various studies have shown that

adoptive parents must afford their adopted children opportunities to find their identity by

being honest with them about their history.

Building on the TAPS-R study, there was a more recent study done to test the link

between efficacy of racial awareness and cultural racial socialization and practices of racial

awareness and cultural and racial socialization (Lee). Racial awareness is important because it

means that the adoptive parents are both aware of the impact of race in their own lives and aware

of how it can impact their adoptive children’s lives. This requires the parents to integrate other

races into their lives and be openminded to the viewpoints of people of other races. Socialization

is the parent’s ability and effort to be involved in practices outside of their own culture and,

specifically, into their children’s culture of birth. Being engaged in racial and cultural

socialization can, in part, instill racial and culture pride in their child. It can also equip them to

deal with prejudice and discrimination. Self-efficacy is the parent’s belief that he or she can
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confidently engage in the socialization of their children. If a parent shows confidence in their

ability to engage racial and cultural socialization with their children, it is more likely that they

will be successful in doing so. This study, and those before it, show that parents that have

adopted internationally or transracially who get involved via socialization practices with their

children can help the children realize a better sense of adjustment, a higher level of self-esteem

and a truer sense of belonging. In addition, it can assist children in forming a more positive

racial identity and help them overcome any racial bias or discrimination they may face in the

future (Lee).

Racial identity and cultural identity are, of course, at the root of what can affect

international adoptees. But there is also another aspect to consider, and that is the formation of

their adoptive identity. For a long time, being adopted had its own stigma attached to it, so that

many times, a child had no knowledge of being adopted. More recently, adoption, including

transracial and international, has happened in huge numbers and has become readily accepted by

most cultures. The adoption identity has to do with building the adoptee’s self-esteem within the

constructs of their adoptive family.

While racial and culturally identity focus mainly on families where the adoptee is

racially and culturally different from their family, adoption identity affects adoptees across the

whole adoption spectrum, no matter the age, culture or race. There was a study published in 2016

that sought to find ways to help transnational adoptees adjust in their new families. The study

focused on three things, biological parents, their personal history and their birthday. The

adoptees in the study all knew of their adoption and had adoptive parents who were open with

them about their story. However, there were times when the history simply wasn’t known, which

left the adoptees to think about their life if they would not have been adopted. The study found
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that adoptees probably need to have an ethnic identity and an adoptive identity to truly have

security in their identity. Because the adoptive parents were honest with their history, it was

shown that the adoptees had a great sense of pride about being adopted. They saw their adoption

as something that made them feel very special, because their adoptive parents chose them,

specifically, to be their child. When it came to birthdays, it was shown that those adoptees who

knew the actual date they were born had a better connection to their story and, therefore, their

self-identity.

We have identified that while there are those who subscribe to the idea that completely

assimilating an internationally adopted child is still a practice followed by some, it has become

more and more clear that adoptive parents need to engage in social and cultural socialization. So

how is it that we can equip adoptees to live between their biological culture and their adoptive

culture while maintaining their individual identity? First, a potential adoptive parent should

engage in education about the culture, ethnicity and religion of the country from which they want

to adopt. There are many parents who will begin their journey just wanting to find a child who

needs a family. Doing some research may help the parent decide if, first of all, transnational

adoption is really what they want to do, and what countries are they willing to explore for

adoption. Answering some of the pre-adoption questions from the TAPS-R study may help a

prospective parent think about their future as a multicultural family. They must assess where

they are with their own racial awareness and self-efficacy. The more they are aware, the more

they can empower their adoptive children to be aware.

When they have found what they believe they can successfully handle, then there are

things they can do after the adoption. Being open and honest from the very beginning of the

adoption is crucial to the self-esteem of their child.

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Whatever history the adoptive parents are aware of should be shared. If and when the

child begins to question their history, the adoptive parents should be willing to do the research to

help their child find the answers. They should even be willing to return to the child’s country of

origin to help them explore their biological

identity, culture and race. In addition, diversity

needs to be part of everyday life. If a parent

adopts a child from Ethiopia but lives in a

suburban, all-white neighborhood with an all-

Figure 2 A Multi cultural, multi national
adoptive family (Bestlawyer).
white school and an all-white church, how will that

help a child of color ever be comfortable? They should seek out opportunities to engage in

activities that incorporate the child’s culture and/or race into their lives. They might attend

festivals, concerts and movies that are culturally appropriate. They can find recipes and prepared

ethnic foods together and talk about why these are meals eaten by that culture. They should read

books that talk about historical figures from their culture, race or religion. They could engage

them, if interested, in learning the language of their biological country. Maybe they could even

learn it with them and practice together at home.

It has been shown that one of the very most important things to inspire high self-esteem

and identity is to talk about racism, prejudice and bias. If a child is never told about these things,

then they will never know how to deal with them, or even recognize them for that matter. It is

important that an international adoptee be able to connect with their biological, ethnic, cultural

and religious history. It is equally important that they be able to understand the culture in which

they have been adopted. That includes the good, the bad, and the ugly of discrimination and how

they will have to face it on a regular basis.

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There have been many who have suggested that pre-adoption education, post adoption

education and ongoing education are all necessary to the well-being of the child. This includes

classes, workshops, support groups and family counseling. This continuing education can help

adoptive parents acquire more confidence in their ability to parent international children. Support

groups, alone, can create an environment where the families who have adopted from similar

ethnicities and/or religions can get together and help their children collectively explore their

history and have someone who looks just like them to explore alongside them. Counseling can

ensure that the parents are on the right track and that the children are thriving emotionally and

not feeling lost and without culture or identity.

In conclusion, adoptive parents of internationally adopted children can and should strive

to help their children maintain their cultural, racial and adoptive identities by having open

conversation, getting involved in multi-cultural activities and equipping them with the necessary

tools to deal with prejudice and discrimination. Adoption has come a long way since the times

of orphaned children being sent to relatives or friends to be used as a source of extra labor

without receiving any of the rights of a biological child. There have been many strides in

making sure the process is done in a way that satisfies an ethical practice that allows children

from other countries to be placed with families who are ready to be their forever family. When

international adoptions began, parents were well intentioned with their desire to bring a child

into the family and forget about where they came from and who gave birth to them. While these

parents meant no harm, it has now come to the attention of many that simply ignoring a child’s

past, no matter how traumatic, only serves to further hurt the child. They must know where they

came from. They have to identify with the country where everyone looks like them. They must

know what God it is that those in their country of birth pray to. They need to know the history of
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their biological culture, the good, the bad and the ugly of it. They need to find heroes in the

culture from which they were born to identify with and be inspired by. But, in addition to that,

they need to have adoptive parents who are open to sharing the whole story, not just the romantic

parts. They must be willing to engage in conversation that helps the child have confidence in

who they are and who they are going to be. Being open, honest and accepting will make them

draw closer to their adoptive family and take on that culture, in addition to their biological one.

These kids need to identify with both cultures to truly have a sense of self. Adoptive parents can

equip them by open dialogue about their differences and why people might point that out through

microaggressions or flat-out discrimination and racial bias. International adoption can be a

wonderful thing for both the adoptive family and the adoptive child. The key is education,

honesty and love.

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Works Cited

Bestlawyer, and Related. “International Adoption.” Law and Daily Life, 11 Nov. 2015,

lawdailylife.com/international-adoption/. 

Darnell, F. J., Johansen, A. B., Tavakoli, S., & Brugnone, N. (2016). Adoption and identity

experiences among adult transnational adoptees: A qualitative study. Adoption

Quarterly, 20(2), 155-166. doi:10.1080/10926755.2016.1217574

Frette, Sarah, "I look Asian. I was raised by Whites. I feel Cultureless. An Autoethnographic Case

StudyApproach on Transracial International Adoption Loss of Cultural Identity" (2020). Creative

Components. 582.

Harf, A., Skandrani, S., Sibeoni, J., Pontvert, C., Revah-Levy, A., & Moro, M. R. (2015).

Cultural identity and internationally adopted children: Qualitative approach to parental

representations. PLOS ONE, 10(3). doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0119635

Lee, J., Crolley-Simic, J., & Vonk, M. E. (2016). Transracial adoption parenting scale--revised

version. PsycTESTS Dataset. doi:10.1037/t67861-000

Lee, J., Vonk, M. E., Han, J., & Jung, S. (2018). A path analysis of a cultural and racial

socialization model in international transracial adoption: Racial awareness, self-efficacy,

and socialization practices. Children and Youth Services Review, 85, 333-340.

doi:10.1016/j.childyouth.2018.01.002
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Moffett, A. (2017, April 05). Trafficking in children? Actually no – why illegal adoption is not

child trafficking. Retrieved March 21, 2021, from

https://humantraffickingcenter.org/trafficking-children-actually-no-illegal-adoption-not-

child-trafficking/

O'HALLORAN, K. (2018). ADOPTION LAW AND HUMAN RIGHTS: International

perspectives. S.l., NY: ROUTLEDGE.

Roberts, K. (Ed.). (2003, April 7). The origins of adoption in America. Retrieved March 21,

2021, from https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/americanexperience/features/daughter-origins-

adoption-america/

“The Adoption Symbol: Adoption Network: Adoption Network.” Adoption Network |, 16 Dec.

2020, adoptionnetwork.com/the-adoption-symbol/.