Family Matters: Secrecy and Disclosure in the History of Adoption

by E. Wayne Carp

Adoption is a hot topic--played out in the news and on TV talk shows, in advice columns and tell-all tales--but for the 25 million Americans who are members of the adoption triad of adoptees, adoptive parents, and birth parents, the true story of adoption has not been told until now. Family Matters cuts through the sealed records, changing policies, and conflicting agendas that have obscured the history of adoption in America and reveals how the practice and attitudes about it have evolved from colonial days to the present.

Amid recent controversies over sealed adoption records and open adoption, it is ever more apparent that secrecy and disclosure are the defining issues in American adoptions--and these are also the central concerns of E. Wayne Carp's book. Mining a vast range of sources (including for the first time confidential case records of a twentieth-century adoption agency), Carp makes a startling openness, not secrecy, has been the norm in adoption for most of our history; sealed records were a post-World War II aberration, resulting from the convergence of several unusual cultural, demographic, and social trends.

Pursuing this idea, Family Matters offers surprising insights into various notions that have affected the course of adoption, among them Americans' complex feelings about biological kinship versus socially constructed families; the stigma of adoption, used at times to promote both openness and secrecy; and, finally, suspect psychoanalytic concepts, such as "genealogical bewilderment," and bogus medical terms, such as "adopted child syndrome," that paint all parties to adoption as psychologically damaged.

With an unswerving gaze and incisive analysis, Carp brings clarity to a subject often muddled by extreme emotions and competing agendas. His book is essential reading for adoptees and their adoptive and biological families, and for the countless others who follow their fortunes.

Genres: Adoption

320 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1998

Reviews

[Rudy Owens · Rating 4 out of 5]

E. Wayne Carp's seminal history on the history of U.S. adoption is a must-read by anyone interested in U.S. social history of the 20th century.

As an adoptee who struggled decades to find my biological kin and obtain my original birth records held from me by the State of Michigan and the Lutheran adoption agency and successors that placed me in the 1960s, I found his work utterly refreshing. I especially appreciated how he highlighted in precise detail how professional groups, including those in the mental health profession, were overzealous in categorizing adoptees as being prone to illness, often with poorly designed studies that do meet standards for sound research. Carp also provides an excellent overview of some of the key legal battles different adoptee groups and their allies have led.

I recommend Carp's work to everyone who wants to learn how adoptees, now in the millions, are still denied equal treatment by law through laws that deny them access to their family records and connecting with their kin. If you are someone who cares about human rights and equal rights for millions of Americans, consider adding this to your "to read" list.

[Jen · Rating 2 out of 5]

This book was a real mixed bag for me, an adult adoptee. I’m glad I read it, because it is part of adoption history, but I wouldn’t recommend it for a current accurate comprehensive understanding of plenary adoption practices. The author, in my opinion, was siding toward the end of the book with secrecy and traditional adoption rather than writing from a neutral observer voice. The book is also 30 years old and much has changed. For instance, it is widely understood now that “open adoption” is simply a manipulation ploy by potential adoptive people to secure a child at any cost, and then they reneg on the agreement which is not enforceable by law once they have possession of the infant.

[Jane · Rating 2 out of 5]

This desperately needs updating.

[Jessie · Rating 3 out of 5]

Another book I read for class, as an example of the politics that come up in recordkeeping. Interesting if you are interested in the subject matter. I wish there were more on the early history of adoption (trains of orphans shipped off to the midwest); the recent politics are no so interesting.