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In Conversation with Margaret Watson about her book Surviving Secrets
It’s several years since your memoir Surviving Secrets was published and I reviewed it for the Australian Journal of Adoption. How has your life been in the intervening years since the book went to print? Thank you for that review Thomas and your support for my memoir. It is coming up to 7 years since […]
April 22, 2016
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In Conversation with Maria Haenga-Collins, adopted person and PhD Candidate
I spoke to Maria Haenga-Collins, a PhD candidate in the Australian Centre for Indigenous History (School of History) at the Australian National University, about her studies and her experience of adoption. Maria is a Māori (Ngāti Porou, Te Aitanga-a-Mahaki, Ngāi Tahu) woman who was first fostered, then adopted, into a Pākehā (white) family in the mid […]
April 16, 2016
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Adoption Revivialists – Recreating a Shameful Past?
Adoption is often seen as the panacea for social ills. For much of the latter half of the 20th Century adoption was used to forcibly remove children from young mothers to shield society from the shame of having children out of wedlock. The mothers, fathers and their children often deserted in their time of greatest […]
April 7, 2016
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Secrets, Spies and Spotted Dogs
I spoke to Jane Eales about her book Secrets, Spies and Spotted Dogs. Jane I have read your book which gives a detailed account of your late discovery that you were adopted and subsequent search for family, particularly your mother. It’s a great title and absorbing read. Did writing the book come easy to you? […]
March 29, 2016
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Coming of Age
‘What if abandoning a child was the greatest act of love this world has ever known?’ This statement was made by Victor Alexeyev, one of five young adult adopted people, who spoke at the Coming of Age session at the Redefining Family conference in Auckland. Victor, along with Alex Gilbert, Alexander Kuch, Katya Murray and Voichita […]
March 18, 2016
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Counselling Experiences of Adult Adopted People
I spoke with Sue Rogers about her Masters thesis and her experience of living with adoption. More about Sue I grew up in Melbourne and have lived there all my life. My parents have a holiday house on the Mornington Peninsula at an area that is not well known. It is quiet, has dirt roads, […]
March 15, 2016
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National Apology for Forced Adoption
National Apology for Forced Adoptions The third anniversary of the National Apology for Forced Adoption is fast approaching. It was delivered by former Prime Minister Julia Gilliard in the Great Hall of the Australian Parliament on 21 March 2013. The ornate parchment in guilded, coloured and black calligraphy sits inside Parliament House alongside the National Apologies for […]
March 11, 2016
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When Adoption is Forever
Adoption is forever. Over the decades there have been few days when I haven’t thought about my adoption and its impact on my life. Adoption stays with you always. Consequently, you do need to make provision for it, make sense of it, or find peace with it, otherwise it is likely to prod, nag, itch, […]
March 11, 2016
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Redefining Family Conference:
Early this year I attended the Redefining Family Conference in Auckland, New Zealand. This conference provided a first time opportunity for me and others to listen to researchers, professionals and lay-persons from the fields of donor conception, surrogacy and adoption reflect on, and explore the dynamics, of families created through these means. Not that I’m […]
March 2, 2016
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Without Consent:
Without Consent, an exhibition about Australia’s past adoption practices, has began its nine venue, two-year tour of the regions, beginning in Kalgoorlie, Western Australia. The exhibition, developed by the National Archives of Australia, examines past adoption policies and practice drawn from the contributions of those directly impacted; the mothers, fathers and children – now adults […]
February 29, 2016
