Adoption Identity Race Exploration (AIRE)
AIRE was created out of the need for an inclusive space for BIPOC adoptees (of all genders, identities, and experiences) to build and collaborate. AIRE…
Resource Race: Mixed/Multiracial
Child Mind Institute: “Trauma & Grief”
This webpage features countless articles about the basics of recognizing and addressing trauma in children. It includes topics like the effects, causes, and treatments of…
Nursing License Map with edX: “Anti-Racism Resources for Students and Professionals in Healthcare”
This article explores the history of mistreatment and discrimination in healthcare that puts people of color at a disadvantage. It also discusses the changes that…
RESilience: Books About Race and Ethnicity
This is a directory of books about race, organized by age. It features books for young children, elementary school-age children, teens, and adults, as well…
The National Museum of African American History and Culture (NMAAHC): “I Am a Parent or Caregiver”
The NMAAHC’s purpose is to help children understand what race is, how it operates in society, and why it’s important (particularly in the US). This…
“Daddy Why Am I Brown?”: A healthy conversation about skin color and family
This is a children’s book meant to start a conversation about how kids can learn to talk about skin color in a way that’s kind,…
Resilience – “Reading and RES: Parent Tip Tool: Choosing and Using Books to Discuss Race and Ethnicity”
This brief article explains how reading books with your child is a key way to start and continue conversations about race and ethnicity. It also…
Beynd the Golden Rule
This illustrated book serves as a parent’s guide to preventing and responding to prejudice. This book explores how to discuss racism and tolerance depending on…
American Academy of Pediatrics: “Talking to Children About Racial Bias”
This article explains how children learn racial bias, strategies to help children deal with these biases, and how parents can confront their own racial biases.…
RESilience – Engaging My Child: “Parent Tip Tool: Uplifting Families Through Healthy Communication About Race”
This is a brief parent tip tool that explains what RES (racial and ethnic socialization)is, who participates in RES, and suggestions for engaging in RES.
Online MSW Programs with edX: “How to Teach Kids About Race”
This article discusses how to teach children about the concepts of race, privilege, and racial and ethnic socialization (RES). Though this resource is primarily for…
The New York Times – “A Conversation on Race: A series of short films about identity in America”
This video project features countless different videos of people sharing their experiences with racism and racial identity. The site even welcomes readers to submit personal…
Beyond Words Psychological Services
This LLC, established by Dr. Chaitra Wirta-Leiker, offers a directory of professional (medical and mental health) resources in the Denver Metro Area. Dr. Wirta-Leiker specializes…
House of Rainbow
House of Rainbow serves LGBTQ+ people of color and faith. This organization works to combat religious homophobia and validates the belonging of LGBTQ+ in religious…
National Queer & Trans Therapists of Color Network (NQTTCN)
This organization works to advance healing justice by transforming mental health for queer and transgender people of color. They have lists of community and practitioner…
Inclusive Therapists
Inclusive Therapists serve underrepresented communities through its mission to be a mental health liberation movement creating change through decolonial education, collective care, and activism. They…
God Painted Me
This is a children’s picture book that discusses transracial adoption. It uses religion to portray adoption and human creation.
The Family Book
In this children’s picture book, the author celebrates many different types of families. He assures readers that no matter what kind of family you have,…
The White Swan Express: A Story About Adoption
This is a children’s picture book that talks about the process of adoption from China. It shows the steps from the adoption agency paperwork, to…
The Red Thread: An Adoption Fairy Tale
This story originates from the ancient Chinese belief that an invisible, unbreakable red thread connects everybody destined to be together. In this children’s book, a…
The Red Blanket
This is the story of the author’s journey to China to adopt a baby girl. It’s a heartwarming adoption story that reveals the challenges, as…
Ten Days and Nine Nights: An Adoption Story
This book follows a little girl as she and her family prepare for a new child. It shows the girl’s mother flying off to Korea,…
A Mother for Choco
This is a children’s book about a young bird (Choco) who journeys to find a mother who looks just like himself. Eventually, he is taken…
I Love You Like Crazy Cakes
This is a children’s book that tells the story of a woman who travels to China to adopt a baby girl. It’s based on the…
In Their Own Voices: Transracial Adoptees Tell Their Stories
This is a collection of interviews of Black and biracial young adults adopted by white parents. It features personal stories of two dozen individuals “who…
Adopted (2008)
This tells the story of two adoptees and their families. One family is a couple excitedly preparing for the adoption of a baby girl. The…
Adoption Support Alliance
The ASA offers a beginner’s adoption course designed for prospective adoptive families. The class discusses various aspects of adoption, including logistical challenges, managing grief and…
InnoPsych
An organization dedicated to “healing to communities of color by changing the face and feel of therapy.” Their goal is to make therapists of color…
Approved for Adoption (2012)
An animated film about a Korean adoptee joining a Belgium family and his return to his birth country. The story follows him over the course…
Time: “The Realities of Raising a Kid of a Different Race”
An article written by an adoptive mother about what every parent should know about transracial adoptions. This article is applicable to adoptees, but focuses on…
Closure (2013)
A transracial adoptee finds her birth mother and meets the rest of her family who did not know she existed, including her birth father. This…
Lion (2016)
A movie about a birth family search based on a true story. A child from India gets lost, taken thousands of miles away from home,…
Angela Tucker
Angela Tucker is a multimedia phenomenon leading discussions about race, class, and identity. She was adopted from foster care to a white family, and grew…
Twin Sisters (2013)
This heartwarming documentary is about twin sisters who are adopted by different families. They find their way back to each other via social media. This…
First Person Plural (2000)
A documentary about an 8-year old girl who was adopted by an American family. She later discovers that she has a birth family in Korea.…
Searching for Go-Hyang (1998)
A film about twin sisters who are adopted into the US, but return back to Korea 14 years later. They hope to explore and reconnect…
Blue Bayou (2021)
A movie about a Korean adoptee raised in Louisiana. He struggles to make a better life for his family. However, he must confront his past…
Off and Running (2009)
A movie about an African-American adoptee with white, Jewish lesbians parents and two other adopted siblings beginning to become more curious about their roots. Her…
White Sugar Brown Sugar
A blog by a mom about her adopted children. She doesn’t disclose their names or faces out of respect and describes her adoptions as domestic,…
The Seattle Times: “Adoption across races: ‘I know my parents love me, but they don’t love my people’”
An article where adoptee Angela Tucker discusses feeling like a racial impostor growing up. She explains that while she looked Black, she didn’t feel that…
NCFA: “Positive Practices in Transracial Adoption Parenting”
In the article, an adoptee asserts that parents must bring up the topic of adoption first and work with their children to understand their feelings.…
Angela Tucker: The Adopted Life
A 2-hour virtual workshop led by a transracial adoptee (Angela Tucker). Families leave understanding how transracial adoptees progress from racial awareness to racial identity, as…
Children’s Bureau: “Parenting in Racially and Culturally Diverse Adoptive Families”
A factsheet from the Children’s Bureau that explains how to support a child’s racial and cultural identity, embrace life as a racially and culturally diverse…
Child Welfare Information Gateway: “Adoption by Family Type: Racially and Culturally Diverse Families”
A resource page from the Child Welfare Information Gateway with links to information about racially and culturally diverse adoptions.
American Adoptions NEWS: “25 Helpful Resources for Transracial Adoptive Families”
A resource page with links to transracial adoption blogs, websites, books, Facebook groups, and more.
NPR: “White Kid, Black Family: Transracial Adoption”
An article about a Black father and his family’s experience with raising a white child and transracial adoption.
Rudd Adoption Research Program UMASS Amherst: “Promoting Adoptees’ Well-Being in Transracial Adoptive Families”
An article with parenting techniques designed to support and uplift transracially adopted children. It also has a bibliography which features additional useful resources.
NCFA: “The Adoptive Parent’s Responsibility when Parenting a Child of a Different Race”
An article about the different ways adoptive parents can and need to support their children. This specifically discusses the issues, privileges, and challenges of adopting…
Adoptive Families: “How to Be an Anti-Racist Adoptive Parent”
An article on how to actively challenge racism and discuss privilege, especially in the context of a multiracial family.
NBC News: “All-American, with one foot in China”
A brief article about the need for adoptive parents to educate their children adopted from China about racism, identity, and the reality of life in…
“Raising Our Multiracial Family”
A Black woman shares the story of her multiracial family. One of her four children is a white, adopted son.
NPR: “A Mother Reflects On Privilege, Adoption And Parenting ‘Without Perfection'”
An interview about a white mother’s reflection on her life raising two adopted Black children and two biological white children, and how she became aware…
NACAC: “Transracial Adoption: Love is Just the Beginning”
An article by Deb Reisner, mother to a family with African-American, Native-American, Latino, and European-American children. She details the importance of listening to her children…
American Adoptions: “4 Unique Challenges Faced By Transracial Adoptees”
An article by American Adoptions that examines some of the challenges that many transracial adoptees face.
Adoptive and Foster Family Coalition New York: “Racism and Microaggressions in Transracial Adoption”
This is a resource page which features articles that discuss the racism and microaggressions that accompany transracial adoption.
Rhonda M. Roorda, MA
Rhonda is a transracial adoptee from New York. She is an author and public speaker and her work focuses on her identity as a Black…
NPR: “Growing Up ‘White,’ Transracial Adoptee Learned To Be Black”
An article and podcast on NPR about a Black, transracial adoptee. Chad Goller-Sojourner reflects on his identity and experiences growing up with white parents and…
BuzzFeed News: “What A Black Woman Wishes Her Adoptive White Parents Knew”
An essay from the perspective of a Black, transracial adoptee. The author discusses the racial dynamics in a family with transracial adoption.
NPR: “The Parenting Dilemmas Of Transracial Adoption”
This article examines the problems of color-blind parenting and how parents need to acknowledge and celebrate racial diversity. There’s also a 40-minute long audio version…
Diary of a Not-So-Angry Asian Adoptee
The blog of Christina Romo — a Korean adoptee, mom, wife, and advocate. She details her life, thoughts on adoption, and provides the perspective of…
