Appendix: Critical Adoption Studies with Nia

This week we're joined by Nia (they/them) for a conversation about critical adoption studies — a field of scholarship that explores adoption as a legal, political, and economic institution that severs and creates familial bonds. We begin with a review of our episodes on motherhood, class, feminist literary theory, queer theory, critical race theory and the nation-state before heading into a chat about narratives of adoption. Through a closer look at the way Harry and Voldemort are both positioned as orphans with vastly different destinies, we consider how their unique relationships to kinship, motherhood and reproduction inform our understanding of them as a hero and a villain, respectively.