Tag: adoption

Bissenbakker, Mons & Lene Myong. Governing belonging through attachment: Marriage migration and transnational adoption in Denmark. (2022)

~ mortenstinus

Bissenbakker, Mons & Lene Myong. Governing belonging through attachment: Marriage migration and transnational adoption in Denmark. Ethnic and Racial Studies, 45(1), 2022, 133–152.

Based on analysis of legal documents on family reunification and educational material concerning transnational adoption in Denmark, this article suggests that the concept of attachment may be conceptualized as a specific operationalization of belonging, and that belonging and biopower may be viewed as intertwined (rather than opposites). The analysis conceptualizes two modes of how belonging is operationalized through attachment. The belonging of families seeking reunification is targeted on a regulatory level via the legal requirement of national attachment. This requirement materializes as a prognosis of belonging in families seeking reunification. On a disciplinary level, psychological attachment discourse is utilized to address belonging in adoptive kinship. As a disciplinary instrument, psychological attachment discourse extracts affective labour from the adoptee in order to secure belonging in the form of psychological attachment, which serves to sustain the white adoptive family. In both cases, attachment discourse naturalizes the governing of belonging over time.

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1080/01419870.2021.1876901

Marvel, Stu, Reproducing the Intersections of Inclusion and Exclusion: Exploring Gender Recognition Laws, Reproductive Technology, and the Children’s Act in Denmark. (2022) [PDF]

~ mortenstinus

Marvel, Stu, Reproducing the Intersections of Inclusion and Exclusion: Exploring Gender Recognition Laws, Reproductive Technology, and the Children’s Act in Denmark, AG About Gender – International Journal of Gender Studies, 11.22 (2022)

This paper explores a November 2017 ruling from a Copenhagen appellate court, which involved a transgender man, his cisgender female partner, and their child conceived through third-party donor conception. In mapping the inclusions and exclusions performed by multiple domains of law, this paper applies an intersectional heuristic to track the state reproduction of reproductive norms. Although the plaintiff, a Korean adoptee, had legally changed his gender identity from female to male by the time the child was born, the case arose when he sought recognition of his fatherhood – not motherhood – for his mixed-race child. Intersectional analysis offers a powerful tool to map the dense cluster of Danish law at work in this case, as an institutional matrix that simultaneously recognized self-elected gender identity; denied socially gendered parenthood; and failed to register claims to inter-generational racial affiliation within cross-cutting legal architectures.

PDF: https://doi.org/10.15167/2279-5057/AG2022.11.22.2018

Rasmussen, Kim Su, and Eli Park Sorensen. ‘Minor Subjects/Minor Literature: Maja Lee Langvads Find Holger Danske and the Search for Danishness’. (2011) [PDF]

~ mortenstinus

Rasmussen, Kim Su, and Eli Park Sorensen. ‘Minor Subjects/Minor Literature: Maja Lee Langvads Find Holger Danske and the Search for Danishness’. 비교문학 Journal of Korean Adoption Studies, vol. 54, 한국비교문학회, 2011, pp. 225–249.

PDF: https://www.researchgate.net/publication/339570857_Minor_Subjects_Minor_Literature_Maja_Lee_Langvad%27s_Find_Holger_Danske_and_the_Search_for_Danishness. https://www.researchgate.net/publication/339570857_Minor_Subjects_Minor_Literature_Maja_Lee_Langvad%27s_Find_Holger_Danske_and_the_Search_for_Danishness.

Kim-Larsen, Mette A. E. ‘Danish Milk’. (2018) [PDF]

~ mortenstinus

Kim-Larsen, Mette A. E. ‘Danish Milk’. Adoption & Culture, vol. 6, no. 2, Ohio State University Press, 2018, pp. 353–363.

Drinking milk cites white and Danish and thus frames the lactose-tolerant subject with firstness. This is grounded in a discourse of unilinear evolutionary progression that constructs the lactose-tolerant body as a metaphor for the Danish nation-state and makes lactose-intolerant adoptee bodies an external threat.

doi:10.26818/adoptionculture.6.2.0353.

PDF: https://www.jstor.org/stable/10.26818/adoptionculture.6.2.0353.

Ivenäs, Sabina. ‘White Like Me: Whiteness in Scandinavian Transnational Adoption Literature’. (2017) [PDF]

~ mortenstinus

Ivenäs, Sabina. ‘White Like Me: Whiteness in Scandinavian Transnational Adoption Literature’. Scandinavian Studies, vol. 89, no. 2, [Society for the Advancement of Scandinavian Study, University of Illinois Press], 2017, pp. 240–265.

From introduction:  This paper problematizes the concept of whiteness by applying it in the context of the Scandinavian transnational/transracial adoptee. What is unique about the Scandinavian transracial adoptee is that theyalmost exclusively grow up and live in white segregated middle- class environments  (Hübinette  2007).  Nevertheless,  Scandinavian  trans-racial  adoptees  blend  in  seamlessly  with  white  Scandinavian  society  in  terms  of  language,  culture,  and  behavior.  at  the  same  time,  in  contrast to transracial adoptees in more diverse countries such as the such as the United  States,  Canada,  France,  Australia,  and  the  Netherlands,  the  Scandinavian transracial adoptee non-white body becomes extremely concrete (Hübinette 2007, 117). In this paper, which conducts a critical reading of Scandinavian transnational adoption autofiction, I consider how Scandinavian transracial adoptees negotiate the fact that they, as non-white  individuals  are  raised  in,  and  thereby  indoctrinated  into,  the whiteness norm. In line with Dyer’s perspective on how whiteness is studied within white Western culture, this paper sets out to explore how self-representation of whiteness is depicted in Scandinavian trans-national adoptee autofiction. How do the Scandinavian transnational/transracial adoptees represent themselves as white in literary texts?

doi:10.5406/scanstud.89.2.0240.

PDF: https://www.jstor.org/stable/10.5406/scanstud.89.2.0240.

Kim-Larsen, Mette A. E. ‘Hvid mælk – om racialisering af mælk og laktoseintolerans i forbindelse med transnational adoption’. (2016) [PDF]

~ Dansk Racismeforskning

Kim-Larsen, Mette A. E. ‘Hvid mælk – om racialisering af mælk og laktoseintolerans i forbindelse med transnational adoption’. Kvinder, Køn & Forskning, no. 4, 4, 2016.

In Denmark, ‘lactose intolerance’ refers to a medical diagnosis and a condition where the person is unable to digest lactose, a sugar found in milk and dairy products. However, 75% of the world’s population is considered lactose intolerant which raises the question: under which circumstances is lactose intolerance considered a disease in Denmark? In order to answer this question, this article examines different subjectifying processes in relation to health, race,ethnicity, and the consumption of food, and the relation of all of these factors to milk. The analysis focuses on a publication by the Danish adoption organization Adoption og Samfund (Adoption and Society), a special issue on food. Influenced by the work of Butler (1990, 2004), Omi & Winant (1986) and Myong (2009), I find that milk comes to determine whiteness and Danishness in the publication. Consequently, lactose tolerance functions as a figure for the normalizedbody belonging to the white adopter, who is framed by firstness and situated in the Global North. At the same time, lactose intolerance functions as a figure for the deviant, weak, medicalized body belonging to the adoptee of colour who is framed by otherness and situated in the Global South. Hence, drinking milk (or not) positions the subject either as part of a privileged majority or an underprivileged minority.

doi:10.7146/kkf.v25i4.104396.

PDF: https://tidsskrift.dk/KKF/article/view/104396.

Kroløkke, Charlotte, Lene Myong, Stine W. Adrian, and Tine Tjørnhøj-Thomsen, editors. Critical Kinship Studies. (2016)

~ Dansk Racismeforskning

Kroløkke, Charlotte, Lene Myong, Stine W. Adrian, and Tine Tjørnhøj-Thomsen, editors. Critical Kinship Studies. London ; New York: Rowman and Littlefield International, 2016.

In recent decades the concept of kinship has been challenged and reinvigorated by the so-called “repatriation of anthropology” and by the influence of feminist studies, queer studies, adoption studies, and science and technology studies. These interdisciplinary approaches have been further developed by increases in infertility, reproductive travel, and the emergence of critical movements among transnational adoptees, all of which have served to question how kinship is now practiced.  Critical Kinship Studies brings together theoretical and disciplinary perspectives and analytically sensitive perspectives aiming to explore the manifold versions of kinship and the ways in which kinship norms are enforced or challenged.

https://rowman.com/ISBN/9781783484164/Critical-Kinship-Studies

Myong, Lene. ‘Bliv Dansk, Bliv Inkluderet: Transnational Adoption i et in- Og Eksklusionsperspektiv’. (2011) [PDF]

~ Dansk Racismeforskning

Myong, Lene. ‘Bliv Dansk, Bliv Inkluderet: Transnational Adoption i et in- Og Eksklusionsperspektiv’. Pædagogisk Psykologisk Tidsskrift, vol. 48, no. 3, 2011, pp. 268–276,

Idealer om social og pædagogisk inklusion fylder meget i disse år. Men hvilke præmisser betinger inklusion? Og hvordan lader det sig gøre at reflektere over inklusionens egne eksklusioner? Artiklen tager udgangspunkt i et kvalitativt studie af transnational adoption i en dansk kontekst, og den viser både, hvordan inklusion for transnationalt adopterede forudsætter tilpasning til en dansk norm, og hvordan selvsamme inklusion producerer normen som mangfoldighedsvenlig og tolerant.

https://www.skolepsykologi.dk/48–%C3%A5rgang—2011

PDF: https://www.academia.edu/8545035/Bliv_dansk_bliv_inkluderet_transnational_adoption_i_et_in_og_eksklusions_perspektiv.

Jane Jin Kaisen, ed. Loving Belinda, (2015) [PDF]

~ Dansk Racismeforskning

Jane Jin Kaisen, ed. Loving Belinda, Forlaget * [asterisk], 2015.

The Loving Belinda project began in 2006 with the video Adopting Belinda in which Mr. and Mrs. Anderson, a supposedly Asian-American couple in Minnesota, are being interviewed by a Danish TV host for a series on Danish heritage because they have just adopted Belinda, a white girl from Denmark. Everything appears ordinary with the exception that the racial and cultural dynamics are reversed.

The Loving Belinda Project employs the mockumentary genre, appropriating documentary features to destabilize reality with subversive effect. By staging and reversing the racial “order” within transnational adoption, the works expose some of the uneven economic, racial, and cultural relations of power that are embedded within the practice but that tend to remain unspoken.

The videos Revisiting the Andersons and Loving Belinda as well as the photograph The Andersons from 2015,portray how the family is coping now whenBelinda is nine years old in the midst of changing discourses around transnational adoption.

In the Loving Belinda publication, the fictional universe is contextualized by conversations between the individuals involved in the project, whom in reality are all engaged in critical discourse around transnational adoption, anti-racism and whiteness in Scandinavia. 

Contents:

LOVING BELINDA

Adopting Belinda

Revisiting the Andersons

Loving Belinda

The Andersons

CONVERSATIONS

Tobias Hübinette & Jane Jin Kaisen: Transnational Adoption in the Context of Colonial Repression, Race Relations, and the Right-wing Turn in Scandinavia,

Morten Goll & Jane Jin Kaisen: Reflections on Art, Asylum Politics, Racism, and Transnational Adoption

Lene Myong & Jane Jin Kaisen: The Emergence of Adoption Critiques among Transnational Adoptees in Denmark

ESSAYS / PRESENTATIONS

Marianne Ping Huang: Artistic Research as Critique in Jane Jin Kaisen’s Loving Belinda

Louise Wolthers: Framing the Migrant Body

Tone Olaf Nielsen: Curating Anti-Racist, Pro-Migration & Decolonial Projects

http://janejinkaisen.com/loving-belinda-200615

PDF: https://static1.squarespace.com/static/5539922fe4b03e1f32a65bc3/t/557bf05ee4b00283cf1e1590/1434185822742/Loving+Belinda+publication.pdf

Myong, Lene. ‘At Blive En Ligeværdig Dansk Kvinde -Fortællinger Om Race, Køn Og Heteroseksualitet’. (2009) [PDF]

~ Dansk Racismeforskning

Myong, Lene. ‘At Blive En Ligeværdig Dansk Kvinde -Fortællinger Om Race, Køn Og Heteroseksualitet’. Kvinder, Køn & Forskning, no. 2, 2, May 2009.

Drawing from a qualitative study on transnational adoption this article explores the question of racialized becoming in a Danish context. The analysis is based on interviews with adult female Korean adoptees, and it finds that discursively constructed categories of Asian femininity are marked by processes of hypersexualization. Hence, the interviewees negotiate subjectivity from intersections where colonial and racialized fantasies of Asian women, as both victims of patriarchy and inherently sexually promiscuous, clash with Danish ideals of gender equality. Ideals that are racialized as white.

doi:10.7146/kkf.v0i2.27986.

PDF: https://tidsskrift.dk/KKF/article/view/27986.

Frello, Birgitta. ‘Sporløs–Om Biologi, Identitet Og Slægten Som Fjernsyn [Find My Family-On Biology, Identity and Kinship on Television]’. (2011) [PDF]

~ Dansk Racismeforskning

Frello, Birgitta. ‘Sporløs–Om Biologi, Identitet Og Slægten Som Fjernsyn [Find My Family-On Biology, Identity and Kinship on Television]’. MedieKultur: Journal of Media and Communication Research, vol. 27, no. 51, 2011, pp. 19-p,

DR har i de senere år lanceret flere programserier, som har slægt og slægtsforskning som fokus. Slægtsprogrammer er ’godt fjernsyn’ i den forstand, at de giver mulighed for en umiddelbar identifikation med hovedpersonen, samtidig med at dennes historie kan bruges som løftestang for andre historier. Imidlertid anlægger programmerne en vinkel på slægten, som forudsætter, at et øget kendskab til den biologiske slægt automatisk medfører et øget kendskab til den personlige identitet. Denne selvfølgeliggørelse af den biologiske slægts betydning problematiseres i artiklen, og med udgangspunkt i Sporløs diskuteres mulige implikationer og konsekvenser af den forståelse af slægten, som programmerne tager udgangspunkt i og tager for givet.

PDF: https://tidsskrift.dk/mediekultur/article/download/4073/5038.

Ben-Zion, Sigalit. Constructing Transnational and Transracial Identity: Adoption and Belonging in Sweden, Norway, and Denmark. (2014)

~ Dansk Racismeforskning

Ben-Zion, Sigalit. Constructing Transnational and Transracial Identity: Adoption and Belonging in Sweden, Norway, and Denmark. Palgrave Macmillan US, 2014.

Norway, Sweden, and Denmark are home to more than 90,000 transnational adoptees of Scandinavian parents raised in a predominantly white environment. This ethnography provides a unique perspective on how these transracial adoptees conceptualize and construct their sense of identity along the intersection of ethnicity, family, and national lines.

doi:10.1057/9781137472823.

https://www.palgrave.com/gp/book/9781137480644.