kritter513's review
challenging
dark
emotional
hopeful
informative
reflective
sad
medium-paced
4.75
This memoir is beautiful and complex. Adoption is complicated and this gets into the nuance of the many aspects of that. “I tell the audience about how I grew up, of finding my family, and of still feeling ungrounded. And I tell them why: I carry the burden of colonization. I don't belong; I find myself on the outside looking in, no matter where I am.”
liralen's review against another edition
4.0
As an infant, Harness was adopted; as a teenager, she began searching for her roots and was told that her birth family was dead or deadbeat or both; as an adult, she finally began to uncover the truth.
After he adopted me from my fractured reservation family, I think he believed if he could raise me just right, I wouldn’t be Indian anymore. If I was white I would be free from prejudices, free from the hatred so entrenched in Montana culture. But in the American West, being Indian is what you are, not what you choose to be, especially if you look like one. (174)
Harness tells such a painful story here, one that so many people could have made less painful and yet...didn't. As she tells it, while her mother accepted Harness fully as her child, her father never really understood that he could not make Harness white by osmosis, or that his casual racism could cause so much harm. And although Montana had a specific sort of racism: no matter where, or with whom, Harness was raised, she was always going to be a non-white child (and then adult) in a racist society.
I wondered at times, reading this, if life would have been easier for Harness had she been raised somewhere other than Montana—New England, or California, where there isn't such immediate clash between white culture and reservations. But of course that would only bring in a whole host of new problems (further distance between child and birth culture, even fewer people around who shared facial features and skin tone and history, etc.), not to mention that it sounds like a very ineffective Band-Aid on the gaping wounds that white Americans have inflicted, and continue to inflect, on Native populations.
I've been talking much more about content and context than about the actual book and writing, so: personal story and broader picture play off each other here, and the book is more powerful for it. Micro- and macroaggressions in context, and years and years of history that whitewash will and should never be able to remove, no matter how hard people try.
After he adopted me from my fractured reservation family, I think he believed if he could raise me just right, I wouldn’t be Indian anymore. If I was white I would be free from prejudices, free from the hatred so entrenched in Montana culture. But in the American West, being Indian is what you are, not what you choose to be, especially if you look like one. (174)
Harness tells such a painful story here, one that so many people could have made less painful and yet...didn't. As she tells it, while her mother accepted Harness fully as her child, her father never really understood that he could not make Harness white by osmosis, or that his casual racism could cause so much harm. And although Montana had a specific sort of racism: no matter where, or with whom, Harness was raised, she was always going to be a non-white child (and then adult) in a racist society.
I wondered at times, reading this, if life would have been easier for Harness had she been raised somewhere other than Montana—New England, or California, where there isn't such immediate clash between white culture and reservations. But of course that would only bring in a whole host of new problems (further distance between child and birth culture, even fewer people around who shared facial features and skin tone and history, etc.), not to mention that it sounds like a very ineffective Band-Aid on the gaping wounds that white Americans have inflicted, and continue to inflect, on Native populations.
I’m tired. I’m tired of carrying this burden of nonbelonging. It’s not really mine to carry. It belongs to my birth family, who opted not to do what was required to keep us out of the system. It belongs to child-placement policy experts, who think removing children and erasing their past by erasing information about their birth family and then placing them in the midst of a society whose history promotes a barely veiled hatred toward indigenous people will produce healthy, happy, and stable children. It belongs to my adoptive father, who didn’t question the racism that surrounded me and didn’t protect me when it entered our home in his alcohol-driven tirades. It belongs to my tribe, who refused to offer “welcome home ceremonies” because, as one tribal member put it, we’ll muddy the waters by bringing our white wives or white husbands to the reservation. It belongs to American Indians who see us as people seeking our birthright because we are trying to get something for nothing: the free health care, cheap housing, a tribal job. We are not interested in those things. We are interested in knowing who we are, where we come from, and who we are related to. We want to learn and know our culture. We want the legitimacy that these same Indian people have been given. But that burden should be heavily carried by white America, who can now pretend that, because we are being raised in a white, middle-class family, everything will be okay. For many white Americans, history and its consequences have no meaning. But right now I alone am carrying this burden and the emotional landslide has begun. (234)The numbers of Native children adopted out of reservations and birth families are staggering—by 1972, says Harness, almost a third of Native children had been taken and placed with non-Native families (227), which feels a great deal like a shitty modernisation of the (equally shitty and racist) policy of removing children to boarding schools meant to 'civilise' them (and train them to be good servants, basically). It's hard to look at Harness's upbringing and say that any one thing would have made a difference—she could have been kept with her biological family, but they too had a great deal of instability; she could have been placed with a more supportive adoptive family, but the surrounding culture would still be racist; more people could have told her the truth sooner, but there are always others who hold information that they don't want to share; and on and on it goes. No, the necessary changes are much broader: the US government upholding its promises and honouring its treaties; policies that work not just to keep children with their natural families but to support those families; investment in community resources and jobs that strengthen reservations...the list goes on.
I've been talking much more about content and context than about the actual book and writing, so: personal story and broader picture play off each other here, and the book is more powerful for it. Micro- and macroaggressions in context, and years and years of history that whitewash will and should never be able to remove, no matter how hard people try.
black_girl_reading's review against another edition
5.0
Susan Devan Harness’ Bitterroot was the first An account of her childhood in a chaotic and abusive white family following her removal from her family and tribal community at 18 months, as well as her journey to piece together her history and her family of origin in adulthood, this book was less a journey of Devan Harness’ healing, and more of a journey into the vulnerability of abandonment and grief that these adoptions create for this children torn asunder from their entire being by colonial policies and extinguishment mandates. Devan Harness, a gentle and careful and patient soul, walked such a careful path in this book, seemingly never able to prioritize her own feelings with an alcoholic adoptive father, a mentally ill adoptive mother, a spouse who seemed to not really understand, and a birth family who she did not want to challenge and push away. And yet. She did arrive. She arrived in her pain, she arrived in her frustration with racism, with bureaucracy, with intergenerational trauma, and with what will be forever a wound in her life - I don’t think that a system this violent can provide an opportunity to fully remediate the trauma of it’s victims. Still, Devan Harness emerges as a powerful force of truth and of advocacy for herself and for other Indigenous children stolen and adopted out, and also becomes a voice for those who straddle the reality of situations that were unsafe for them to remain in and “solutions” that were at least as damaging as what came before that also displaced them from their essential ways of being and belonging. A heartbreaker. A soul toucher. An incredible memoir that dances more with the questions and the small connections than it does with easy answers or closure. Read it.
amanda_woodbury's review against another edition
3.0
A memoir told from a Native adoptee’s perspective and her attempts to reunite her tribal, familial, and personal identities into some sense of cohesion. Losing one’s nuclear family as well as one’s culture is a tragedy not enough addressed in adoption discussions. However, I struggled with the amount of non sequiturs and event hopping that took place in the story, and found it somewhat chaotic to follow (although I’m sure accurately reflective of the author’s own experience). Would still recommend.
razmanda's review against another edition
5.0
A heartbreaking and important memoir about the author’s experience as a transracial adoptee, taken from her tribe and adopted by “nice white people.” She shares the racism, abuse and harm done to her while living in a society not her own, and the difficult task of trying to find her place in any community even after locating her birth family.
alisawilhelm's review against another edition
5.0
Wow this was so good. Intricately layered vignettes that criss-cross across the author's life as much as she criss-crosses the American West provide an intimate context to her life. Susan Devan Harness was adopted when she was 18-months old after being taken away from her negligent mother (and family, and life on the rez, and all that comes with that). She was adopted by a white couple, their only child. Both her birth family and her adoptive family were dysfunctional. She has faced a lifetime of never belonging--not within white society ("too dark"), and not within her Salish tribe ("too white") that she was able to gain access to after a heartbreaking search as an adult. She now advocates for open-ish adoptions--where children's parents may be replaced by adoptive parents, but their families (siblings, extended relatives) are not. This allows for the child to cultivate a sense of belonging and a better grounding for stability in their lives.
It is hard to express everything that is woven into this book: US Government treaties with Native Americans, child welfare policy, missing paperwork, photos, childhood memories, scenes from nature, mental health, mentally ill and aging parents, racism, relationships gone awry, etc etc. it is complex and not straightforward, but at no point did I get lost with too many details or lose track of where I was in Susan's life. It turns out that this book is part of a large series published by the University of Nebraska Press called American Indian Lives. I hope I will be able to read more from this series. I learned so many things I didn't know (I am ashamed I didn't know...) and besides being well written and interesting, this book is imbued with emotion.
It is hard to express everything that is woven into this book: US Government treaties with Native Americans, child welfare policy, missing paperwork, photos, childhood memories, scenes from nature, mental health, mentally ill and aging parents, racism, relationships gone awry, etc etc. it is complex and not straightforward, but at no point did I get lost with too many details or lose track of where I was in Susan's life. It turns out that this book is part of a large series published by the University of Nebraska Press called American Indian Lives. I hope I will be able to read more from this series. I learned so many things I didn't know (I am ashamed I didn't know...) and besides being well written and interesting, this book is imbued with emotion.
speculativebecky's review against another edition
5.0
Susan Devan Harness, born Vicky Charmain Rowan, is a member of the Confederated Salish Kootenai Tribes and was raised from age two by white parents in a predominantly white community in Montana. This memoir recounts her experience growing up visibly Native surrounded by white people and their racism, the abuse and neglect she suffered at the hands of her alcoholic father and mentally ill mother, and her experience trying and finally succeeding at connecting with her birth family. Though in large part her personal story, this book also discusses her research into transracial adoptee experiences, which became a focus of her academic study.
This is a really excellently put together book, Harness tells her story in a not quite chronological order that allows her to dive deep topically, unravelling complex dynamics of her transracial adoption experience, such as being visibly Native but raised white and unknowledgeable about her own culture, which leaves her feeling out of place everywhere. She thoughtfully delves into her fraught relationships with her parents, as well as with her large birth family. I was impressed with this book’s nuanced layers, as well as how she draws together a larger picture than simply her own.
Her experience and the compiled stories of other transracially adopted Indigenous kids drives home a point Haudenosaunee writer Alicia Elliott makes in her brilliant essay collection A Mind Spread Out on the Ground, about how the system in place privileges white neglect over Indigenous love. Harness encounters this mindset again and again from friends, and even heartbreakingly from her birth family, but it was hopeful to see her research and public speaking join with others trying to make changes in adoption policy.
This is a book that swept me up in Harness’s story, and taught me a lot along the way. Definitely recommend, especially to those who enjoy memoir or nonfiction more broadly.
This is a really excellently put together book, Harness tells her story in a not quite chronological order that allows her to dive deep topically, unravelling complex dynamics of her transracial adoption experience, such as being visibly Native but raised white and unknowledgeable about her own culture, which leaves her feeling out of place everywhere. She thoughtfully delves into her fraught relationships with her parents, as well as with her large birth family. I was impressed with this book’s nuanced layers, as well as how she draws together a larger picture than simply her own.
Her experience and the compiled stories of other transracially adopted Indigenous kids drives home a point Haudenosaunee writer Alicia Elliott makes in her brilliant essay collection A Mind Spread Out on the Ground, about how the system in place privileges white neglect over Indigenous love. Harness encounters this mindset again and again from friends, and even heartbreakingly from her birth family, but it was hopeful to see her research and public speaking join with others trying to make changes in adoption policy.
This is a book that swept me up in Harness’s story, and taught me a lot along the way. Definitely recommend, especially to those who enjoy memoir or nonfiction more broadly.