In the last fifty years, transnational adoption—specifically, the adoption of Asian children—has exploded in popularity as an alternative path to family making. Despite the cultural acceptance of this practice, surprisingly little attention has been paid to the factors that allowed Asian international adoption to flourish. This book unearths the little-known historical origins of Asian international adoption in the United States. Beginning with the post-World War II presence of the US military in Asia, it reveals how mixed-race children born of Japanese, Korean, and Vietnamese women and US ser ... More

In the last fifty years, transnational adoption—specifically, the adoption of Asian children—has exploded in popularity as an alternative path to family making. Despite the cultural acceptance of this practice, surprisingly little attention has been paid to the factors that allowed Asian international adoption to flourish. This book unearths the little-known historical origins of Asian international adoption in the United States. Beginning with the post-World War II presence of the US military in Asia, it reveals how mixed-race children born of Japanese, Korean, and Vietnamese women and US servicemen comprised one of the earliest groups of adoptive children. The book moves beyond one-dimensional portrayals of Asian international adoption as either a progressive form of US multiculturalism or as an exploitative form of cultural and economic imperialism. Rather, it acknowledges the complexity of the phenomenon, illuminating both its radical possibilities of a world united across national, cultural, and racial divides through family formation and its strong potential for reinforcing the very racial and cultural hierarchies it sought to challenge.