Leaving “Home” in Search of the “Homeland”: Transnational Encounters among Adopted Korean Returnees, Adoptive Mothers, and Birth Mothers considers the relationships within adoption triads—returned adoptees, birth mothers, and adoptive mothers in South Korea and the U.S.—in order to expand the concept of, “the best interest of the child,” under which transnational adoptions of Korean children were carried out in the mid-twentieth century.

The two primary research methods used in this study are participant observation and in-depth interviews. I conducted a pilot study by participating in formal Korean adoptees’ conferences as well as informal gatherings of adoptees held in the northeastern United States. I then returned to South Korea to conduct my field work in 2015. By working as a translator for two motherland tours, I was able to both observe the intense, emotional reunions between the returned adoptees and their birth mothers and interview some of the participants. I also interviewed adoptive mothers, birth fathers, siblings, and social workers. In addition, I volunteered for returned adoptees’ political organizations and participated in their birth family search program.

By presenting birth mothers’ stories, this study sheds light on the sending country, which has so far been left out within the field of transnational adoption studies. The complex relationship between adoptees and their adoptive mothers provides a window to understand the construction of normative motherhood in the U.S. This study argues that a primary motivation for adoptees’ returning lies in how they conceptualize their relationships with their two mothers.

Careful listening to the stories of adoptees, birth mothers, and adoptive mothers, I argue, is needed in order to expand the concept of “the best interest of the child.”