Maverick Mothers and Mercy Flights: Canada’s Controversial Introduction to International Adoption

In the 1970s, two private adoption agencies faced state and public scrutiny over their ‘rescue’ of orphans from Bangladesh, Vietnam and Cambodia. The organizations were run by four Canadian mothers who themselves adopted over fifty children and placed hundreds more with other Canadian families. Inspired by a sense of maternal internationalism, these ‘maverick mothers’ were convinced that removing the children from their war torn nations and bringing them to Canada was in each child’s best interest. According to professional social workers and diplomats, a strong commitment to maternalism and internationalism were not valid enough to trust the complicated operation of international adoption to amateur humanitarians. The mothers’ lack of professional accreditation, their bleeding heart mentality, and examples of radical behavior at home and abroad were seen to threaten international adoption as a legitimate form of child saving. Yet concurrently, the authority and respect granted by the women’s identity as mothers marinated their cause with a certain creditability or at least admiration for their efforts, which gave them a sense of empowerment to challenge and for most of them, to ultimately cooperate with their critics.Au cours des années 1970, deux agences d’adoption privées ont attiré l’attention du public lorsqu’elles ont commencé à « secourir » des orphelins du Bangladesh, du Vietnam et du Cambodge. Ces organisations étaient dirigées par quatre mères canadiennes, qui avaient adopté plus de cinquante enfants entre elles, et en avaient placé des centaines d’autres dans des familles canadiennes. Mues par une sorte d’internationalisme maternel, ces femmes non conformistes étaient persuadées qu’il y allait de l’intérêt de chacun de ces enfants de les retirer d’un pays d’origine déchiré par la guerre pour les amener au Canada. Des travailleurs sociaux professionnels et des diplomates contemporains les critiquèrent, qui croyaient que leur seul engagement maternel et internationaliste, malgré son intensité, ne préparait pas ces humanitaires en herbe à assumer la responsabilité du mécanisme complexe de l’adoption internationale. À leurs yeux, le manque d’accréditation professionnelle de ces mères, leur sentimentalisme, et certaines instances de comportements radicaux de leur part, au pays et à l’étranger, menaçaient la légitimité même de l’adoption internationale comme forme de secours. Pourtant, en parallèle, l’autorité et le respect attribués à ces femmes en tant que mères donnaient crédibilité à leurs efforts, et provoquaient une certaine admiration à leur égard. Ces encouragements les habilitèrent à revendiquer la capacité d’intervenir dans le processus d’adoption. En conséquence, la plupart d’entre d’elles finirent par coopérer avec leurs détracteurs

On Malefic Generosity, Repressive Tolerance and Post-Colonial Condescension: Considerations on White Adult Educators Racializing Adult Education Discourse

When White adult educators engage with the work of authors of color they often mean to treat these respectfully and to ensure these ideas are not marginalized by other Whites. However, in a racist and sexist society the racial group membership and socio-political location of White authors means they can easily end up promoting malefic generosity, repressive tolerance and post-colonial condescension

Genome Sequencing: The Ripping Yarn of The Frozen Genome

AbstractThe completion of the genome sequence of the filamentous fungus Neurospora crassa reveals a gene number very much higher than those of yeasts. Of particular interest in this species are the effects of the repeat-induced point mutation (RIP) process, which appears to have prevented recent evolution through gene duplication in this lineage

Negative Thinking and the Denial of Tolerance: The Challenge of Marcuse to Contemporary Adult Education

This paper seeks to insert critical theorist Herbert Marcuse’s concepts of rebellious subjectivity and repressive tolerance into adult educational discourse

Contesting Criticality: Epistemological and Practical Contradictions in Critical Reflection

Being critical is not an unequivocal concept. It is, rather, a contested idea. How the terms critical or criticality are used reflects the ideologies of the users