Race, Law, and Family Formation in the United States

• In Event: 381 - Section on the Sociology of the Family Refereed Roundtable Session and Business Meeting
  In Refereed Roundtable 60min: Table 12. Intersectionality and Families

Abstract

The purpose of this study was to identify the ways race plays a role in family formation by examining case law and debates relating to transracial adoption. These debates, and legal interpretations are an example of larger theoretical disagreements over how to conceptualize race and ethnicity. The questions I ask are (1) how does the court define race? (2) How is race currently used to make placement decisions in transracial adoptions post two Federal Acts, ICWA and the MEPA-IEAA? Through the content analysis of 44 appellate and higher court transracial adoption cases from 1997-2013 I was able to identify three processes of judicial racial conceptualization.

The first process relates to judicial understandings of race. Race was often treated as an immutable, ahistorical category, reflecting skin color and tone, blood quantum, and ancestral identity by the courts. The second was an analysis of cultural authenticity, however there was little to no discussion of cultural diversity within racial groups. Racial groups were often discussed as having monolithic cultural practices but whiteness was often assumed to mean the lack of culture and race. If a racial match-up between the potential adoptive parent and child was not possible, the third process, finding cultural contacts occurred. Here, the courts used cultural contacts as a proxy for a biological family experience. Adoptions were often granted when the adoptive family could demonstrate their ability to provide the child with cultural contacts or resources and experiences similar to those the judges believed their biological parents would have provided.

Author

• Emma Shakeshaft, University of Wisconsin-Madison