Kinship by Design
A History of Adoption in the Modern United States
- Contents
- Review Quotes
Table of Contents

Contents
Acknowledgments
Introduction: Family Making in an Age of Uncertainty
Part 1: Regulation and Interpretation, 1900–1945
1. The Perils of Money and Sentiment (and Custom, Accident, Impulse, Intuition, Common Sense, Faith, and Bad Blood)
2. Making Adoption Governable
3. Rules for Realness
Part 1: Regulation and Interpretation, 1900–1945
1. The Perils of Money and Sentiment (and Custom, Accident, Impulse, Intuition, Common Sense, Faith, and Bad Blood)
2. Making Adoption Governable
3. Rules for Realness
Part 2: Standardization and Naturalization, 1930–1960
4.Matching and the Mirror of Nature
5.The Measure of Other People’s Children
Part 3: Difference and Damage, 1945–1975
6.Adoption Revolutions
7. The Difference Difference Makes
8. Damaged Children, Therapeutic Lives
Part 3: Difference and Damage, 1945–1975
6.Adoption Revolutions
7. The Difference Difference Makes
8. Damaged Children, Therapeutic Lives
Epilogue: Reckoning with Risk
Notes
Index
Notes
Index
Review Quotes
Barbara Melosh | Women's Review of Books
"Herman limns the shifting paradigms of kinship with thorough research, careful analysis, and incisive prose. . . . Deeply thoughtful and beautifully wrought, Kinship by Design is a history animated by ethical and existential concerns."
Choice
"This well-researched, informative, and thought-provoking book raises questions about the role of professionals, the state, and culture in family engineering, and whether the intellectual and cultural revolution in private life in the last century, or new reproductive medical technologies, are always progressive."
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