|
The emotionally compelling experiences of couples who adopted native children in the late 1960s and early 1970s.
Published by: McGill-Queens University Press Forthcoming May 2002, 256 pp
ISBN 0-7735-2400-224002
Purchase from Amazon.ca
Contact Marie Adams
|
|
Marie
Adams will be presenting at the symposium "Adoption
Breakdown: Lessons Learner" sponsored by the The Northeast
Ohio Regional Training Center and Northeast Ohio Adoption Services,
through the Ohio Child Welfare Training Program.
Please sign the guest book! We'd
love to hear from you.
In
1973 Marie and Rod Adams, brimming with idealism and keenly aware
of the plight of disadvantaged aboriginal children, adopted Tim,
a young Cree boy, two-and-one-half years old. Tim began displaying
severe behavioural problems almost immediately, problems that,
despite their efforts to find help, only became worse over the
years. He left home at the age of twelve and died on the streets
when he was twenty-one. Devastated by their loss, the Adams began
to search for answers as to why things had gone so horribly wrong.
In Our Son, a Stranger Marie Adams describes five white couples whose adoptions of native children failed to meet their expectations. Using her own experiences as background, she casts a critical eye on the "Sixties Scoop" when governments actively encouraged the adoption of native children by non-native parents – an estimated 95 per cent of such adoptions failed – and discusses why the special issues raised by all trans-racial adoptions need to be carefully considered.
AWARD NOMINATION
McGill-Queen's Press has submitted OUR SON, A STRANGER for the Writers' Trust of Canada's Pearson Writers' Non-Fiction Prize. This award is for a work of non-fiction that, in the opinion of the judges, shows the highest literary merit. |
