The Pirate Tree: Social Justice in Children’s Literature just interviewed me about themes and characters in See No Color.
Here’s an excerpt:
“Adoption is a messy business. Everything gets mixed up in everything else: love, anger, frustration, appreciation. And this should not be surprising; if we look closely and honestly at most of our intimate relationships, it’s all there, too. I think it was bell hooks who said that love can, and often does, occur in the context of domination. Which is something I think all of us would do well to reflect on more often, whether you are a white adoptive parent or transracial adoptee, or parenting in a more “traditional” context. Power dynamics matter in relationships. I definitely see this in a whole new way, as a mother to my five-year-old son. On those days when it is particularly difficult for me to mother him, for whatever reason, I try to stop and reflect on the fact that the parent-child relationship is one that is fundamentally unbalanced, that the parent(s) always dominate the dynamics.”
Check out the full text here.