Let’s Talk About Race…Cont. (3)

First, welcome to the new site!

Second, I have been posting a series of excerpts from the work of transracial/transnational adoption expert, Jane Brown. Here is what she has to say about “the pause that refreshes”:

“It is important that [our children] get ‘the pause that refreshes,’ which means, to me, that they get the opportunity to be with others like themselves. They need to get more than just the chance to socialize and be together, though, for children do not connect the dots like we think that they do. Even when we, as parents, tell them and remind them that we bring them together with others like themselves, if they do not get under the surface of just looking at one another and playing together, to talking about what the common demoninators are and how that gives them collective power, it’s not all that useful. In other words, getting together with adopted kids to play is terrific, but not as useful as talking about why they’re there with one another…

One of the things I think we have wrongly assumed is that our children grieve over the loss of their birth culture. First, I think that the ethnic group and cultural identity they need is Chinese AMERICAN and not Chinese. Often, we, as adoptive parents, think that we should provide them with the culture of their homeland. If we think about it, it’s very unlikely that they are going to spend more than a few weeks of their life–if that–in China. If they do, they will be more like second or third generation Chinese Americans because it is not possible or even necessarily desirable or important for them to try to be like Chinese. Instead, they are going to be oriented towards “their people” here, in the USA, not people in China. They are Americans of Chinese heritage, not Chinese who live in America now. And there is a big difference…

I do not believe we should be aiming to impart Chinese culture so much as various aspects of Chinese American culture–which is not, in any way, a uniform culture for all Chinese Americans. It is a composite!

The grief I think we have heard adult adoptees who have been transplanted is due to not having had any choice in where they landed. That is typically when people complain and protest–not just adopted people but ANY displaced person. Our children did not ask to be separated from their first families. They did not ask to be adopted. They did not ask to be placed into families in which they are being raised by parents who don’t look like them when that is the case. They did not ask to be transplanted to another country. The adult adoptees tend to protest this and be anti-international adoption when their perspective is assumed to be that of their adoptive parents. When we hear them speak about loss and a sense of disconnection, and then label them as angry and dysfunctional and don’t, instead, listen with the intent of helping them hold those feelings and have permission to express them AT THE SAME TIME that they express their thoughts and feelings about what they have gained. When we dismiss their point of view because it doesn’t match our expectations, or makes us feel threatened because they are not grateful for all that adoption brought into their lives. When we expect them to continue to feel “special” without hearing and acknowledging that they feel “different” in ways that are not enviable. THAT is when I think we hear adult adoptees saying that it would have been better for them to have never left the land of their birth. We cannot make up for that through giving them a culture that isn’t ours to share, by giving them a culture that is like museum culture–it doesn’t even exist in China let alone in the USA–and that is the culture of another nation rather than of the one they live in.

Our kids, I believe, are better served by our helping them to connect and find a place within the Chinese AMERICAN culture than through trying to replicate what we imagine to be the Chinese culture that exists in present-day China and really doesn’t.

[Too often, we are busy] hosting gatherings that are organized and facilitated by White parents who have invited a few, select Chinese American representatives to join the party. Our kids need and benefit from FCC gatherings, but they do not get Chinese culture or Chinese American culture from those–even if we are engaged in doing things that celebrate or appreciate Chinese culture or holidays through these gatherings. The things that I think are meaningful is to get to see firsthand what it is like to be someone older (and cool!) of Chinese American heritage (like through a mentorship program or a friendship program with university or high school students or senior citizens). To see what they do, what they are interested in, what they are aiming to do with their lives. That they have boyfriends/girlfriends, participate in sports and interest groups, that they do not fit the stereotypical images that our kids otherwise tend to take in, so that they are put-off by what they see when they look in the mirror. To have the opportunity to say to themselves: “I see these Chinese American teens/young adults/adults, and I really LIKE them! They are nice, they lead fascinating lives, they are a lot like every other teen/adult I see, I can see in them the adult I will someday be–and I LIKE that! It is equally wonderful to growing up as a White kid who will turn into a White adult. I don’t have to wish to be White to know that I can and will have a great life!”

I’d like to have the opportunity to comment and talk about Brown’s ideas more fully, especially how making wiser choices about empowering your child’s racial identity will affect your own life choices as an adoptive parent…where you choose to live, with whom you choose to socialize, etc. These are BIG, complicated questions, and I’d love to hear more of your comments as well. I’ll post some of my responses to Brown’s challenges next time.