Adoption., you hear about it all over the news. Mary-Louise Parker, star of the television program "Weeds," has adopted a daughter from Africa, actress Angelina Jolie and actor Brad Pitt have been adopting as well as famous pop singer Madonna, but what about fatherhood in adoptive children and the cultural gaps that are created when adopting children from another country.



Kathleen Lamb recently wrote in the Journal of Family Issues that, ?Adoption has been the purview of the social work field but has received little empirical evaluation by other family scholars. Using the 2002 National Survey of Family Growth, 378 men currently cohabiting with or married to a woman with her own children are evaluated to determine whether the respondent`s biological children affect the odds of adoption of his wife`s or cohabiting partner`s children. Logistic regression results support the social role facilitation hypothesis as the presence of resident, shared biological children the respondent fathered with the current spouse/partner is associated with greater odds of stepparent adoption. The presence of nonresident biological children fathered with a previous spouse/partner reduces the odds of stepfather adoption because men who have such children are less likely to be married. Results suggest that men who adopt their stepchildren are uncommon and new and existing biological children play a role in formalizing relationships with stepchildren.?

It is a study that clearly shows pertinent information when considering adoption or learning more about the subject.

Nothing is more evident in the United States then the increase of adopting children from China. With the influx of Chinese children being adopted by American parents, how are Americans easing or bridging the cultural gap.

As Amy Traver of Qualitative Sociology points out, ?American parents of children adopted from China frequently consume Chinese cultural objects for display in their homes. While parents defend this consumption for display as an effort to validate their children's ethno-cultural origins, they also reveal how it signifies and solidifies their own identifications with Chinese culture. As part of a larger research project examining China adoptive parents? evolving ?Chinese? identities, this paper asks: Which parents ?become ?Chinese?? through the consumption and display of Chinese cultural objects, and why? To answer this question, I conducted semi-structured in-depth interviews with 91 Americans in the China adoption process and ethnographic fieldwork at two different field-sites: Families with Children from China (FCC) Chinese cultural celebrations and Chinese culture camps organized by/for China adoptive families. Focusing on the emergent and personal meanings that parents give to Chinese cultural objects, I demonstrate how these meanings both structure parents? consumption and yield a display differential. In doing so, I reveal that white European-American parents and mothers are most likely to engage in this consumption and display, thereby amending the three types of ethno-cultural identity consumption represented in the literature. Specifically, I expose the central role of race in ethno-cultural identity consumption; demonstrate that the collective category of reference for ethno-cultural identity consumption is not always an ethnic category (in this case, such consumption refers to a gendered category); and illustrate the ways in which global ethno-cultural identity consumption both appeals to and satisfies distinctly local constructs.?

It is clear that many studies exist in answering these questions, but many more need to be done. For many parents, adoption is a wonderful answer to their parental needs. Many experts agree however, that before you jump into adoption, do all of your homework, talk to counselors and make sure it is not only right for you, but the situation will be right for the child.

By Michael C. Podlesny