FamiLee Life

New Adoption Twist to Parachute Kids

I heard about this new, disturbing "adoption for education" trend among Koreans from Twice the Rice's blog. Ji-in does a wonderful job at critiquing the issue at hand, so I refer folks over to her site. If you want to read the article, click here.

Basically, it is a new twist on an old trend. In the past (and still today), we had parachute kids [read related article]. These are Korean children from relatively wealthy Korean families who are sent to boarding school in the States or sent to stay with Korean American relatives (or close family friends) to receive an American education. They are called parachute kids because they were dropped off by plane, solo, without parents. Past news accounts of parachute kids are not glamorous. Kids living alone in apartments with big allowances and fancy cars, getting into trouble with alcohol, gambling, etc. A culture of narcissism for sure. Of course, to be fair, not all kids run into trouble. I know of many parachute kids from back home who are doing fine.

Next, we had Korean families who were going transnational with one parent living in America and the other parent staying in Korea to fund their children's American education. Some call this the kirogi family. Click here for a related story. This migration pattern has been described as flexible citizenship by anthropologist Aihwa Ong,

Now, it seems Koreans are willing to allow American couples (Korean or White) to legally adopt their children for the sake of a "better" education. Of course, better education is a relative concept but that is a different issue. This new brand of parachute kid is being set up for even more problems. It is a bizarre mercenary trade that has so many opportunities for things to go wrong, completely wrong (e.g., exploitation, abuse, abandonment, etc).

When I was in Korea a few years ago, it was considered a matter of prestige and status to send your child off to America for a few years to receive an American education and, more importantly, to learn English. After the IMF bailout of South Korea in the 1990s, the English language has become like currency in South Korea. Everyone wants ot learn some English because Koreans learned (after the fall of their economy) that they need to open their culture to the West in order to succeed in a global economy. So now, this obsession with all things American has now led to the exploitation of this adoption loophole.

Sigh...

Posted by richlee at January 31, 2006 10:02 AM