The Right And Power As Their Mother

Join us for our second episode of season 2 with Shannon Bae. Shannon is a long-time friend, fellow Korean adoptee community activist and organizer, and mother of two amazing kids. This intimate conversation took place in Seoul in the summer of 2023 during the International Korean Adoptee Association's 6th Korea Gathering. In our shared ancestral land, Shannon generously shares about her decision to not explicitly share her adoption story with her children at this point in their development, and her juxtaposing experiences giving birth in Korea and the United States while continuing to cultivate a deeper relationship with her birth mother. Shannon also discusses her children's experiences moving back and forth between Korea and the United States, raising them bilingual, and why she doesn't view translating for adoptee reunions as work.

** As of the publishing on this episode, Shannon has shared about her adoption with both of her children. 

Shannon Bae Bio
Shannon Doona Bae just finished her Ph.D. in Anthropology at UC Irvine. She holds an M.A. in Anthropology from University of California Irvine and an M.A. in Cultural Anthropology from Hanyang University, South Korea. Her research interests include adoption, gender, kinship, and South Korea. Her dissertation, titled “Reconciling DNA: Making kin and nation through genetic testing in South Korea," was supported by the National Science Foundation, Wenner-Gren Foundation, Association of American University Women, Korea Foundation, Center for Critical Korean Studies UCI, Academy for Korean Studies, U.S. Dept of Education Foreign Language Area Studies, and Initiative to End Family Violence UCI. She hopes to publish her dissertation as a book eventually, in order to do justice to all of the adoptees and birth family members who were willing to share their stories with her. She was adopted with her twin sister, Hana, at the age of 4 and has been reunited with her mom since 2013. She has two lovely and mischievous children who keep her on her toes. 

Co-Hosts: Nari Baker & Robyn Park
Music: Mike Marlatt & Paul Gulledge
Audio Production: Augustina Moore & Adrien Prevost
https://august222222.com
Artwork: Dalhe Kim

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