A lightweight and powerful creative file storage

IMG_1078.HEIC

South Korea's Adoption Reckoning (full documentary) | FRONTLINE +  @AssociatedPress

Group of 2 assets

IMG_5082.MOV

IMG_3783.JPG

A Story of Wholeness — Part Two: What is Gained

Dropzone submission link!

IMG_5107.HEIC

IMG_5072.HEIC

IMG_5113.HEIC

IMG_5077.MOV

A Story of Wholeness

IMG_1417.HEIC

new york cover.png

Step 3: Submit!

C Chamberlain - Imagination Fund Proposal

My experience navigating the international adoption system to find and reunify with my biological family after 34 years of separation enabled me to reclaim my Korean identity. As a birth doula and a death doula, I've used the frameworks of life and death and the teachings of Korean shamanism to connect to my culture and inform my creative aspirations.

Lived Experience as a Data Point

Korean families maintain a Jokbo, tracing their clan lineage and acting as a guide to honor ancestors during annual traditions where a sacrificial table is set. Bloodline is a deep source of pride in Korean culture. When we as Korean adoptees are separated from our first families, we are not recorded in our family books because we are often a source of pain, shame, and secrecy. There are currently over 200,000 Korean adoptees living in the United States today. So, I want to create a virtual jokbo by us, for us, to document our existence and to say, we are here.In doing so, we challenge the narrative that reunion is the way to wholeness. Only 5% of us reunify and less stay in reunion. Korean adoptees will self submit a photo, letter, and an object to be set on the ancestral table to be documented in an online site.Through online documentation, adoptees and their descendants have a restored sense of identity, connection, and belonging. By documenting family histories and reclaiming lost narratives, this project empowers adoptees to see themselves as integral parts of Korean culture and history, fostering pride and wholeness regardless of our reunion status with our biological families. It challenges the norm of reunion as the pinnacle of our experiences, denies the idea that reunion will solve our problems or answer big questions, and reclaims the power to self-identify with other adoptees as we wish, in our wholeness. We are here. We belong to each other. We don't need anyone to be full.To do this, I will seek self-submissions from Korean adoptees that includes a photo of themselves, an object they'd like placed on an ancestral table for them, and an open-form letter. My goal is 50 submissions. I will compile photos and documents on a public website to help advance understanding about our community and challenge traditional adoption narratives and place a virtual object rendering on the ancestral table as a visual representation of each adoptee.In the future with outside funding, I hope to have a physical rendering of the ancestral table with physical objects displayed as a way to share the history of adoption with the general public, highlight adoptee experiences, and share the challenges facing our community including deportation (the Adoptee Citizenship Act failed to bring home over 200 deported adoptees under Trump's Administration) and mental health (we are overrepresented in addiction, suicide, anxiety, depression, and behavioral health), while facilitating a broader conversation about adoption.This project will create an opportunity for us to be in community with other adoptees and document that community.In creating this virtual book we document our stories for ourselves. It's a way to acknowledge the missing information, the inaccuracies, errors, and lies on our formal documents. Here on the jokbo page, we choose how we are remembered. We take our power back.When completed, this project will create new possibilities for the adoptee community by establishing continuity with their roots, helping to mend cultural disconnection, and creating spaces where we can honor our ancestry in ways previously inaccessible. This lineage book stands as a living testament to the richness of our heritage and the significance of our place within the broader Korean narrative.