Karin Evans is a journalist. Her book, Lost Daughters of China: Abandoned Girls, Their Journey to America, and the Search for a Missing Past alternates between her story of adopting a one-year-old Chinese girl and her research into the circumstances leading to the abandonment of so many girls from China.
(I should point out, as I’ve written before, that abandonment is not always—nor even usually in other countries—leaving a child to its fate. In countries where there are no adoption agencies helping birthparents nor laws allowing the relinquishment of babies, leaving a child in a place where she will easily be found is the closest one can get to “making an adoption plan”. Chinese girls should be aware that they were not just tossed away, but in the overwhelming majority of cases were taken where they would be quickly found and cared for.)
Evans’ book was one of the first to present, in clear language, information for the American public about the mixture of traditions, social pressure and government policies in the hitherto-unknown world of the Chinese birthparents. Written in 2000, there was already a large group of families concerned with these issues. Since China’s 1992 law officially permitting foreigners to adopt Chinese children, thousands of American parents have adopted children from China. Although not well-publicized, there are boys awaiting adoption from China, but most of them are older or have special needs. Over 90% of the healthy infants and toddlers are girls.
Evans’ book reads easily, like a memoir, and indeed she shares her own story of losing an infant son and years later deciding to adopt from China. She describes her adoption trip. She was not permitted to tour the orphanage from which she picked her daughter up in the reception area. She describes the officials she met, the long journey, and the incongruity of finding her daughter dressed in layers of clothes including a T-shirt from Trump’s Casino Resort.
Evans’ daughter was estimated to be three months old when she was brought to the orphanage. It was Evans’ wondering about what it was like for the birth family to care for her for three months and then give her up which started her researching.
Evans, who previously worked in Hong Kong, gives insights into Chinese culture, both from her acquaintances and from Chinese literature and folk sayings, into how girls were treated.
In the Confucian tradition, sons care for their parents in old age. Once they marry, daughters are part of the husband’s family and no longer of the birth family. Thus, it is a practical economic matter of needing a son to survive in old age, as well as of family and community pressure to have one. One man, who had smothered two infant daughters, told questioners that he had done so because it would have been an overwhelming sin to not provide a male heir for his father and ancestors. While it is hard to understand such a mindset, it is useful to try.
Evans discusses the famine in mid-twentieth-century China, whose scope was largely hidden from the outside world. Evans also describes the population control policies. Many Americans know of the “one-child policy”, but not many know that in rural areas people with one daughter are allowed to try again for a son. Regulations, and the enforcement of them, also vary by region. Evans estimates that a majority of abandoned daughters are second or third daughters. Therefore, the majority of Chinese girls in the U.S. likely have an older biological sister living in China with her birth parents.
China officially runs public awareness campaigns on the positive things about women, and about the evils of abandonment and infanticide. Yet as Evans points out, neither the Chinese government, nor certain international aid organizations working in the country, provided (as of 2000) a security system for the old. The beginning of free enterprise in China, while benefitting many, has for some destroyed the security they had in collectivism.
This book can be many things to many people. It will be comforting reading for prospective adoptive parents, as Evans shares her successful story, her daughter’s growth and development, and the bonds that have formed in the U.S. among adoptive families who continue to support each other and celebrate Chinese culture. It also provides mental stimulation for those interested in other cultures and social problems, and in trying to imagine what life is like under very different circumstances. Finally, it provides information in a clear and readable way.
One caution: the book is for adults. The descriptions of the famine and of harsh punishments for those who break the population control policies will be distressing for many adopted children.
Please read the following related blogs:
Children’s Books on Adoption from China