The Children Who Waits- Marsha Traugot


Summary
Marsha Traugot, a social worker who worked for the prevention of cruelty against children in her essay, The Children Who Wait describes the state of parentless children in America prior to 1960, only healthy  white infants (babies) were considered to be suitable for adoption by wealthy childless white families. A non-white family, bi‐racial and single families were not considered adoptive. Handicapped, black and bi‐racial children were never considered adoptable even by the social organizations working in this field.

However, after 1960, a great change came in adoption scene in America which upgraded the human value. Various factors like black civil rights moments, women’s movement , legalization abortion , birth control , changing social values, social science research and harsh economic realities of the foster homes contributed to bring the drastic change in the field of adoption and change in people’s attitude towards marriage, there was a scarcity of white babies in the foster homes for adoption . Unwed mothers started facing less social criticism which inspired them to look after their babies by themselves that contribute towards scarcity of babies in the foster homes. Due to the scarcity, people waiting to adopt children diverted their attention to other children living in the foster homes.

The effect of children’s long stay in foster homes that contributed pseudo mental retardation, learning disabilities, mental illness and possibility of turning the children into criminals worried the social workers and the government very much. Because of the above reasons along with disappearance of traditional family, the concept of adoptive family has been changed.

In the process of getting idea adoptive families for the waiting children, the agencies have to go through some systematic processes of collecting and disturbing information all over the country. In the event of not getting an ideal family for a child, the agencies involved publish and broadcast children’s profile in mass Medias which often help children getting ideal family. Citing the example of five and half years old, black and handicapped Tommy whose profile has been made public, the writer is very hopeful that she would soon get an ideal family.

Questions to be discussed:
1. Whom does Marsha Traugot refer to as the children who wait? [ 2057-3]
2. Why was it difficult for the handicapped and the black children to find foster family? [060-3]
3. According to Traugot , what changes are transforming the American adoption scene? What factors are responsible for the changes? [060-3]
4. What kinds of parents were considered suitable for adopting children? What kind of children were considered 'Unadoptable'? [062-3]
5.  How do the adoption agencies find the potential parents? [064-3]
6. What had happened to the handicapped children in the past? [065-3]

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