The Anna Jinja Show
The Anna Jinja show focuses on the stories, issues, and questions connected to adoption and foster care experiences.
The host is an international adoptee with biological roots in Korea and adopted roots in the United States. As you can imagine, her journey and experiences as a transracial adoptee are multifaceted. Her experiences have been with the pain of discrimination and rejection as well as the joys of self-discovery and learning to embrace all aspects of her identity.
Along the way, she has discovered that she is not alone. We’re all – in some ways – adopted into or out of homes, cultures, communities, and relationships as we grow and evolve. This show illuminates the theme of adoption, in all ways, in our lives. And how those experiences create who we are and who we are yet to be.
Her hope is that through engaging with the guests and creative content, we are welcomed home in this world, cradled in the belief that we belong, that we are worthy, and that we are loved.
So stay tuned, and you may discover your own adoption story.
- Update frequency
- every 6 days
- Average duration
- 28 minutes
- Episodes
- 91
- Years Active
- 2023 - 2025
Marian Matthews Clark & "Just for the Time Being"
Marian Mathews Clark, author of These Doors and Sixty-Something and Flying Solo, shares how, in the University of Iowa’s Writers Workshop, Marian took a revision class from Jane Smiley, where the par…
Dr. Erin Morgenstern & Ian Vidovic
Dr. Erin Morgenstern's conversation centers on adoption, defined as the transitive verb to take by choice into a relationship. Erin shares her thoughts about the family we are assigned and the famil…
Amanda Assalone Cho & Nick Kizirnis
Amanda Assalone Cho was born in Seoul, South Korea, and adopted into a white family in Tulsa, Oklahoma. She always believed that she was given up for adoption because her birth mother was young and c…
Bruce Dalzell & "Come Find Me"
Bruce Dalzell was raised in Athens County Ohio and he describes himself as a child of clashing cultures. Where the Appalachian coal fields meet a large state university and its citizens of Cleveland …
Wendy Merb-Brown & Emily Brown
Wendy and Emily are mother and daughter who help the host connect to her middle name "Jinja" in a unique way. Anna has struggled with her middle name because it has been a source of embarrassment and…
Dr. Frank Gaertner & Kim Hanken
Dr. Frank Gaertner is the Senior Associate Director of Academic Advising at the Emory College of Arts and Sciences. Anna and Dr. Gaertner discuss his 35 years career in academic and student affairs w…
Patty Mitchell & Sarah Schneider
What do adoption, art, and creativity all have in common? Tune into a conversation with artist, social entrepreneur, and the founder of Passion Works Studio, Patty Mitchell to find out! Patty discuss…
Debra Rentz & Stephanie Kendrick
What do an earthquake, the San Andreas Fault, pizza, and an opera singer who is an adoptee have to do with our guest, Debra Rentz, and Athens Poet Laureate, Stephanie Kendrick? Tune in and find out!
Ana Hays McCracken & Ian Vidovic
Ana Hays McCracken, author of Redacted—A Memoir of Adoption, shares the story of her twenty-two-year search for identity and how she comes to terms with the missing pieces of her personal story.
Ian…
Ellie Olin & Claire Steele
Ellie Olin is a business owner, belly dancer, and adoptee. She shares what she learned about herself after finding her biological family after taking the 23 and Me genetic test. Claire Steele, a Bri…
Holly Marlow & Nick Kizirnis
Holly Marlow is the mother of two children, one biological and one adopted, and an author of Delly Duck, a children's book about adoption. Holly discusses with Anna how she became an author and the b…