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International Korean Adoption: A Fifty-Year History of Policy and Practice. Edited by Kathleen Ja Sook Berquist, M. Elizabeth Vonk, Dong Soo Kim and Marvin D. Feit New York: The Haworth Press, 2007, 409 pp., ISBN: 9780-7890-3065-8.
At first glance, this book is an important contribution to adoption literature mainly due to its multidisciplinary approach to understanding the practice of international adoption from South Korea to the present. It is divided into seven parts, which range from an historical overview of international Korean adoption to child welfare practice to issues around identity and family and practical implications. The book also attempts to bring together some of the experiences of adoptive parents, adoptees, and birth mothers as well as broader perspectives of different adoptive countries (Australia, United States and The Netherlands) and South Korea as the birth country. The contributions from the authors provide a useful overview of international adoption practice that is not only academically engaging but also, at times, emotionally evocative. This is reflective of adoption itself, which raises a number of issues relating to identity, racism, globalisation, gender politics, and kinship, which is unavoidably grounded in the lived experiences of those immediately involved in the...