Sarah Park Keynote: Storying Adoption

Sarah Park Keynote (Room 182) 4:30 – 5:30 P.M.

Since the early 1950s, more than 200,000 Korean children have been sent from South Korea to North America and Europe to be adopted into previously all-white families. More than 110,000 were adopted into the United States and Canada. Representations of these transnationally and transracially adopted Koreans have appeared in over fifty American children’s books since 1955. What kinds of stories do they tell? How are librarians and educators to evaluate these books? And what do Korean adoptees think of these depictions? In this keynote, Dr. Park will share her analyses regarding the content and context of children’s literature depicting transracially adopted Koreans.

Panel 4: Queer Themes in Children’s and YA Texts

Panel 4 (Room 156) 12:45 – 1:45 P.M.
Chair: Rob Bittner

Thaddeus Andracki, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
“Here’s to Overcoming Our Parents’ Dreams for Us”: Gendered Racializations and
“Deviance” in Two Young Adult LGBT Novels

Robert Bittner, University of British Columbia
“Why Can’t I Wear a Dress?”: Perceived Homosexuality and Non-Normative Gender
Performances in Books for Children

Hannah Dyer, University of Toronto/OISE
Queer Desire, ‘Growing-up’ and ‘Becoming’: On Alain Berliner’s Ma Vie en Rose (My
Life in Pink)