Relinquished: The Politics of Adoption and the Privilege of American Motherhood

by Gretchen Sisson

Overview

"Essential reading." —NPR “Books We Love”

“Dares to imagine a different world where Americans treat adoption like the justice issue it is.” ―Washington Post

“Impressively reported…[Sisson] uses her deep well of knowledge to make the case that adoption is no solution for Americans’ reduced access to abortion.” ―San Francisco Chronicle

A powerful decade-long study of adoption in the age of Roe, revealing the grief of the American mothers for whom the choice to parent was never real

Adoption has always been viewed as a beloved institution for building families, as well as a mutually agreeable common ground in the abortion debate, but little attention has been paid to the lives of mothers who relinquish infants for private adoption. Relinquished reveals adoption to be a path of constrained choice for those for whom abortion is inaccessible, or for whom parenthood is untenable. The stories of relinquishing mothers are stories about our country's refusal to care for families at the most basic level, and to instead embrace an individual, private solution to a large-scale, social problem.

With the recent decision in Dobbs v. Jackson Women's Health Organization revoking abortion protections, we are in a political moment in which adoption is, increasingly, being revealed as an institution devoted to separating families and policing parenthood under the guise of feel-good family-building. Rooted in a long-term study, Relinquished features the in-depth testimonies of American mothers who placed their children for domestic adoption. The voices of these women are powerful and heartrending; they deserve to be heard.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781250286772
Publisher:	St. Martin's Publishing Group
Publication date:	02/27/2024
Pages:	320
Sales rank:	75,573
Product dimensions:	5.60(w) x 7.70(h) x 1.30(d)

About the Author

Gretchen Sisson, Ph.D., is a qualitative sociologist studying abortion and adoption at Advancing New Standards in Reproductive Health (ANSIRH) in the Department of Obstetrics, Gynecology, and Reproductive Sciences at University of California, San Francisco. Her research was cited in the Supreme Court’s dissent in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization and has been covered in The Washington Post, The Nation, All Things Considered and Consider This, New York Magazine, VOX, and other outlets.

Editorial Reviews

★ 12/04/2023

Sociologist Sisson’s comprehensive and harrowing debut draws on a decade of interviews and archival research to argue that America’s current discourse around adoption belies its insidious history of targeting vulnerable mothers and children. As Sisson points out, adoption remains one of the few bipartisan areas of political agreement: the left supports it as a means of building chosen families, while the right views it as a means of maintaining the nuclear family and curtailing abortion rates. Yet the reality, Sisson argues, is that the adoption industry has historically been predicated on state-sanctioned family separation. She traces America’s long history of child removal, including the sale of children born into slavery, the forced assimilation of Native American children, and the conscription as farm laborers of children born to poor white mothers in the 19th century. She pinpoints the emergence of the modern adoption industry in the post-WWII “baby scoop” era, when unmarried women were coerced into relinquishing their children, and shows that today’s private adoption industry continues in the tradition of separating disadvantaged families. Throughout, Sisson foregrounds the stories of mothers who gave up their children for adoption, juxtaposing their personal monologues with sociological and historical research that highlights broader patterns in their testimonies. The result is a devastating and urgent condemnation of America’s adoption industry. (Feb.)

Publishers Weekly

FINALIST, 2024 GODDARD RIVERSIDE STEPHAN RUSSO BOOK PRIZE FOR SOCIAL JUSTICE

"A devastating and urgent condemnation of America’s adoption industry."

—Publishers Weekly (starred review)

"Provocative, urgent..."

—Kirkus

"Provocative, in-depth, and scholarly. For readers interested in the history of adoption."

—Library Journal

“[A] crucial piece in understanding reproductive justice and the unequal ways we create and care for families in this country.”

–Booklist

"Deftly wrangles with what can feel like conflicting truths, especially those that have endeared adoption to liberals...."

—Jezebel

"Sisson uses personal accounts to uncover the experience of American mothers who place their children for adoption. In the aftermath of Dobbs and the Supreme Court’s negation of abortion rights, Sisson’s studies are even more relevant."

—Alta

"In 'Relinquished: The Politics of Adoption and Privilege of American Motherhood,' Sisson, now a sociologist argues that we've been fed a myth about adoption, one that centers adoptive parents and ignores the lasting trauma experienced by birth mothers (and often, adopted people as well)."

—The Boston Globe

"Contributes to our national understanding of what reproductive justice really means."

—Gloria Steinem

“As American women lose reproductive rights long thought sacred, Relinquished is a forceful reminder of who wins and who loses in the making of the modern American family.”

—Washington Independent Review of Books

"A compelling read, an important, thought-provoking book.”

—Arlie Hochschild, sociologist and author of Strangers In Their Own Land

“Meticulously and empathetically researched. The stories of these women are gripping, intimate, and powerful.”

—Anna Malaika Tubbs, sociologist and author of The Three Mothers

“Sisson offers us a set of rich, sharply illuminating and very personal adoption stories along with her own equally powerful context and analysis. This book shows us the harmful inadequacies of the position, championed by Justices Alito and Coney Barrett in the Dobbs decision overturning Roe v. Wade, that adoption is the best, moral alternative."

—Rickie Solinger, co-author (with Loretta Ross), Reproductive Justice: An Introduction; and author, Beggars and Choosers: How the Politics of Choice Shapes Adoption, Abortion, and Welfare in the United States

"A must-read."

—Melissa Guida-Richards, adoptee and author of What White Parents Should Know About Transracial Adoption

“Fills an important gap in the national conversation around adoption and pregnancy decision-making by centering the stories of those most impacted.”

—Cecile Richards, former president of Planned Parenthood and author of Making Trouble

“One of the best books on pregnancy decision-making I have ever read.”

—Renee Bracey Sherman, founder of We Testify and reproductive justice advocate

“Powerful...will change the way you think about adoption.”

—Diana Greene Foster, demographer, author of The Turnaway Study

"Brilliantly complicates the "happy home" adoption narrative advanced by both conservatives and liberals, and places it in contested political and social spaces where notions of motherhood, reproductive rights, and choice are shaped by race, poverty and gender."

—C. Nicole Mason,President, Institute for Women's Policy Research

“As jurists and politicians push adoption as an alternative to abortion, Gretchen Sisson’s compelling, compassionate book is timely and essential reading. By putting birth parents at the center, Relinquished complicates the rosy popular narratives of adoption, liberal and conservative alike. But it is also a profoundly human and moving account of real people's lives, told with sensitivity and grace.”

—Irin Carmon, co-author of Notorious RBG

“If I could, I’d make every judge and lawmaker in the country read this book. Gretchen Sisson’s Relinquished fills a critical hole in adoption scholarship—covering the years closest to present day—making clear that the ethical problems that have long plagued the industry aren’t just a matter of history. This is a vitally important book for all who care about reproductive justice and freedom, and a sorely needed corrective for anyone who thinks adoption is the solution to a post-Roe United States.”

—Kathryn Joyce, author of The Child Catchers: Rescue, Trafficking, and the New Gospel of Adoption

"Sisson’s powerful, poignant research into the aftermath of adoption is a must-read in this era of staggering income inequality, escalating abortion bans and a non-existent social safety net. Relinquished confronts the question too many choose to ignore: '"What do ‘choice’ and ‘agency’ really mean, when the system has already whittled away all your options?'"

—Jessica Bruder, author of Nomadland: Surviving America in the Twenty-First Century and Snowden’s Box

From the Publisher

11/01/2023

Every year, nearly 20,000 women place their children for adoption. Sociologist Sisson (Univ. of California, San Francisco), whose research was cited in the U.S. Supreme Court's dissent in Dobbs v. Jackson Women's Health Organization, seeks to share a new perspective on this subject. Adoption is embraced by both sides of the political aisle, but Sisson believes that TV shows such as 16 and Pregnant feature narratives about pregnancy and adoption that don't mesh with reality or the true experiences of parents. Utilizing more than 100 interviews with birth mothers of various professions, religions, and socioeconomic statuses, the book, academic in tone, explores how they made the challenging decision to place their child for adoption and what consequences this had on their lives. The adoptions mentioned in this book took place between the years 2000 and 2020 in all regions of the U.S. Sisson also looks back at times in history when people—enslaved, Indigenous peoples, and others who were oppressed—were forced to have babies, who were then sold or yanked away. Birth fathers are not included in Sisson's survey; the author opted to have a conversation about adoption with a single focus. VERDICT Provocative, in-depth, and scholarly. For readers interested in the history of adoption.—Julia M. Reffner

Library Journal

2024-01-17
A sociological study on the contemporary practice of adoption.

As a researcher at Advancing New Standards in Reproductive Health, Sisson has spent years studying reproductive health, abortion, and adoption. In an opening case study, the author describes a young woman who was physically abused by her boyfriend and had no familial support, requiring her to join “a cohort of American women that is remarkably small,” numbering only about 19,000, forced to “relinquish” their newborns. Most adoptive parents are white and prosperous enough to devote time and resources to raising families, which poor mothers do not have. The number is small because, in many cases, abortion is preferential to carrying a child through to birth. Not all of Sisson’s many subjects are poor: The 100 women in her sample sets “represented the full range of American life—their paths had all led them to adoption at one point, one way or another, but they were often on different trajectories.” Interestingly, she notes, poor families are not less capable of raising children, contrary to conservative arguments; it is access to resources that makes for differentials of outcome. The author also shows how adoption is a big business. More than half of the adoption centers in the U.S. are affiliated with evangelical churches, and they receive millions of dollars in public funding in many states. A built-in contradiction exists in the ideology of adoption: The women who keep their children are often considered inadequate to be mothers, but by giving up their babies, “they are better parents because they do not parent their child; the permanent separation rendered by adoption redeems them of their deviations and deficiencies.” Sisson concludes by deeming adoption the product of inequalities that speak to “social and systemic failure.”

A provocative, urgent look at a severely dysfunctional system, with children as the victims.

Kirkus Reviews