VOA慢速英语20061106b

THIS IS AMERICA - Foreign Adoptions² an Increasingly Popular Choice for AmericansBy Jerilyn Watson

Broadcast: Monday, November 06, 2006

VOICE ONE:

Welcome to THIS IS AMERICA in VOA Special English. I'm Faith Lapidus.

VOICE TWO:

And I'm Steve Ember. This week -- a report on the growing number of Americans who adopt children from other countries.

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VOICE ONE:


Madonna visits orphanage³ in Malawi

Madonna, as you might have heard, is in the process of adopting a baby from Malawi. The one-year-old boy named David was flown last month to London. The American pop music star and her husband have a home there. Madonna is married to film director Guy Ritchie and is the biological mother of two children.

David's mother died soon after giving birth. His father, Yohane Banda, a farmer, said he could not care for the baby. So Mister Banda placed David in an orphanage.

Madonna recently gave millions of dollars to support efforts to help orphans⁴ in Malawi. The southern African country is one of the poorest nations in the world.

VOICE TWO:

Madonna says she wants to give David a better life. But some people criticized her for adopting a child whose father is still alive, even if the father did agree to it. And some child psychologists and social workers said children do best if they are well cared for in their own homeland.

The adoption¹ is not yet final. The Lilongwe High Court gave Madonna and her husband temporary custody⁵ of David on October twelfth. The court order is for eighteen months. During that period a social worker will report on how the boy is being cared for.

A committee of sixty-seven human rights groups in Malawi argued that adoption laws there normally bar international adoptions. The committee has brought a legal action to make sure Madonna did not receive special treatment.

Madonna says she did not. And she has supporters. They include Jane Aronson, an influential⁶ expert on adoptions and head of the World Orphans Foundation. She says Madonna is offering David a new life.

VOICE ONE:

Most people who adopt children from other countries are not famous. They are people like Miriam and John Baxter of Bethesda, Maryland. The Baxters have a biological daughter named Olivia. Olivia was almost eight when her new brother, Matthew, arrived. The Baxters adopted Matthew from an orphanage in South Korea.

They had thought about adopting a baby from China. But their plans changed five years ago after the World Trade Center attack in New York. A nearby office where they needed to get a document to satisfy Chinese adoption requirements was closed temporarily.

Waiting for the office to re-open would have delayed the process another month. And the Baxters already faced a year of waiting.

Then they learned that it might be faster to try to adopt a child from South Korea. Miriam Baxter has a brother and sister who were adopted from there. And, in her words, we wanted the child so much, we just could not wait any longer.

Matthew is five now. He was seven months old when his new parents brought him home.

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VOICE TWO:

There are many older children in the United States who could be adopted. Finding permanent homes for them is difficult, especially if they have physical or emotional problems. People who want to adopt usually want a child who is healthy and very young.

But the number of children given up for adoption in America has decreased sharply. In nineteen seventy-three, the Supreme⁷ Court ruled that women have a right to end unwanted pregnancies⁸. Also, more unmarried mothers are keeping their babies than in the past.

So, for more and more Americans looking to adopt, the answer is to look in another country. The State Department approved immigrant visas for eight thousand foreign adopted children in nineteen eighty-nine. By last year the number was almost twenty-three thousand.

The Census⁹ Bureau says two and a half percent of all children in the United States are adopted. Of those, about thirteen percent are foreign-born.

VOICE ONE:


adopted twin girls days after adoption

Immigration reports show that last year, the largest numbers of adopted foreign children came from China and Russia. Americans adopted almost eight thousand children from China last year. Many children also came from Guatemala and South Korea.

In the past, Americans could adopt Romanian children. But now Romania bars most foreign adoptions.

VOICE TWO:

Years ago, few unmarried Americans or couples older than about forty adopted babies. Today, it is much more common for single people to adopt. The same is true of older married couples and older singles. Some couples of the same sex also adopt children.

Adoption laws differ from state to state. People who want to adopt must show they can provide a safe and loving home. But sometimes they have to wait years until an adoption agency can find a child for them.

So they might seek a private adoption -- for example, by paying a woman to have a baby for them.

By some estimates, the average cost of an adoption is less than twenty thousand dollars. But some parents pay a lot more. Foreign adoptions can also be costly¹⁰. For example, to adopt a Russian child can cost more than thirty thousand dollars.

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VOICE ONE:

Many adoption agencies in the United States handle foreign adoptions. For parents, the easiest adoptions often involve what is called direct relinquishment¹¹. This means the biological parents might be dead. Or they might have already surrendered their child to an orphanage.

But, like many other adoptions, international adoptions take time -- in some cases, many months. Adoption agencies and the State Department have a number of requirements for people who want to adopt a foreign child.

The prospective¹² parents must prove they are in good health and able to financially support a child. Officials also look for criminal records. And a social worker visits the home, to make sure the home and family will be good for the child.

VOICE TWO:

In addition, prospective parents must meet any requirements of foreign adoption agencies and governments.

For example, many foreign adoption centers require prospective parents to make two trips. On the first, the people meet and spend time with a child. On the second, they complete the adoption process. Parents are advised to repeat the legal process in the United States when they return.

VOICE ONE:

Some doctors in the United States, like Jane Aronson, provide special services for parents who want to adopt a foreign child.

Parents have to know there is a risk that the children they adopt might not be as healthy as they seem.

For example, the State Department last month put out a notice to any Americans who recently adopted a child from southern Kazakhstan. The Kazakh government reported that as many as sixty-one children in the Shymkent area were infected with the virus that causes AIDS.

The State Department said parents may wish to talk to their child's doctor about testing for H.I.V. It said testing is now required for all children from Kazakhstan adopted by American parents as of the middle of September.

VOICE TWO:

The United States has been preparing to put into effect an international treaty called the Hague Convention on Intercountry Adoption. That may happen next year. The treaty aims to fight child trafficking and other problems. Some people are concerned that foreign adoptions could take longer and cost more as a result of rule changes required by the treaty. But the Wall Street Journal noted¹³ last week that the rules will mean adoption agencies have to try harder to get health information on children.

Any adoption can be complex, both for the parents and the child. This is true especially in families with adopted children from other races and cultures. There are issues of identity and acceptance.

To what extent do the parents wish to learn about and honor their children's ancestry¹⁴? To what extent do the children feel different from all the new people around them? As they get older, how might these adopted children come to see themselves?

Matthew Baxter was in an orphanage not so long ago. Now the five-year-old from South Korea is living an American life with a big sister and a father and mother to care for him. Miriam Baxter says people in the park sometimes ask her, Is the little boy yours, or is he adopted? She answers, Both.

(MUSIC)

VOICE ONE:

Our program was written by Jerilyn Watson and produced by Caty Weaver¹⁵. You can read transcripts¹⁶ of our programs and download MP3 files at www.unsv.com. I'm Faith Lapidus.

VOICE TWO:

And I'm Steve Ember, hoping you can join us again next week for THIS IS AMERICA in VOA Special English.

1 adoption   

n.采用，采纳，通过；收养

参考例句：

• An adoption agency had sent the boys to two different families.一个收养机构把他们送给两个不同的家庭。
• The adoption of this policy would relieve them of a tremendous burden.采取这一政策会给他们解除一个巨大的负担。

2 adoptions   

n.采用，收养( adoption的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• Adoption agencies are always so open to alternative family adoptions. 领养中介机构永远都对领养家庭敞开。 来自电影对白
• The number of adoptions has grown in the past year. 去年，收养子女的数字增加了。 来自互联网

3 orphanage   

n.孤儿院

参考例句：

• They dispensed new clothes to the children in the orphanage.他们把新衣服发给孤儿院的小孩们。
• They gave the proceeds of the sale to the orphanage.他们把销售的收入给了这家孤儿院。

4 orphans   

孤儿( orphan的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• The poor orphans were kept on short commons. 贫苦的孤儿们吃不饱饭。
• Their uncle was declared guardian to the orphans. 这些孤儿的叔父成为他们的监护人。

5 custody   

n.监护，照看，羁押，拘留

参考例句：

• He spent a week in custody on remand awaiting sentence.等候判决期间他被还押候审一个星期。
• He was taken into custody immediately after the robbery.抢劫案发生后，他立即被押了起来。

6 influential   

adj.有影响的，有权势的

参考例句：

• He always tries to get in with the most influential people.他总是试图巴结最有影响的人物。
• He is a very influential man in the government.他在政府中是个很有影响的人物。

7 supreme   

adj.极度的，最重要的；至高的，最高的

参考例句：

• It was the supreme moment in his life.那是他一生中最重要的时刻。
• He handed up the indictment to the supreme court.他把起诉书送交最高法院。

8 pregnancies   

怀孕，妊娠( pregnancy的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• Since the wartime population needed replenishment, pregnancies were a good sign. 最后一桩倒不失为好现象，战时人口正该补充。
• She's had three pregnancies in four years. 她在四年中怀孕叁次。

9 census   

n.(官方的)人口调查，人口普查

参考例句：

• A census of population is taken every ten years.人口普查每10年进行一次。
• The census is taken one time every four years in our country.我国每四年一次人口普查。

10 costly   

adj.昂贵的，价值高的，豪华的

参考例句：

• It must be very costly to keep up a house like this.维修这么一幢房子一定很昂贵。
• This dictionary is very useful,only it is a bit costly.这本词典很有用，左不过贵了些。

11 relinquishment   

n.放弃；撤回；停止

参考例句：

• One kind of love is called relinquishment. 有一种爱叫做放手。
• Our curriculum trains for the relinquishment of judgment as the necessary condition of salvation. 我们的课程则训练我们把放弃判断作为得救的必需条件。

12 prospective   

adj.预期的，未来的，前瞻性的

参考例句：

• The story should act as a warning to other prospective buyers.这篇报道应该对其他潜在的购买者起到警示作用。
• They have all these great activities for prospective freshmen.这会举办各种各样的活动来招待未来的新人。

13 noted   

adj.著名的，知名的

参考例句：

• The local hotel is noted for its good table.当地的那家酒店以餐食精美而著称。
• Jim is noted for arriving late for work.吉姆上班迟到出了名。

14 ancestry   

n.祖先，家世

参考例句：

• Their ancestry settled the land in 1856.他们的祖辈1856年在这块土地上定居下来。
• He is an American of French ancestry.他是法国血统的美国人。

15 weaver   

n.织布工；编织者

参考例句：

• She was a fast weaver and the cloth was very good.她织布织得很快，而且布的质量很好。
• The eager weaver did not notice my confusion.热心的纺织工人没有注意到我的狼狈相。

16 transcripts   

n.抄本（ transcript的名词复数 ）；转写本；文字本；副本

参考例句：

• Like mRNA, both tRNA and rRNA are transcripts of chromosomal DNA. tRNA及rRNA同mRNA一样，都是染色体DNA的转录产物。 来自辞典例句
• You can't take the transfer students'exam without your transcripts. 没有成绩证明书，你就不能参加转学考试。 来自辞典例句