British-Chinese adoptees and the transracial experience: whiteness, ‘Chineseness’ and the fluidity of privilege

The experiences of British-Chinese (BC) adoptees are rarely represented in academic research, and the few existing studies are conducted by researchers without lived experience of adoption. While valuable, this work lacks the insider perspective offered here, where an autoethnographic lens situates the researcher’s standpoint as a BC adoptee and mobilises embodied, situated knowledge to add depth and theoretical nuance. This approach also facilitates the production of knowledge grounded in epistemic proximity, creating conditions in which participants can share their experiences more openly. Through a series of focus groups and follow-up interviews with forty-five BC adoptees, this study uses a constructivist approach informed by postcolonial theory and Critical Race Theory to examine how adoptees navigate transracial adoption, particularly in relation to whiteness, ‘Chineseness’, and the fluidity of privilege, as they grow up in predominantly white families. It also considers how they interpret their racial and ethnic identities in everchanging contexts, negotiate belonging, and construct and challenge notions of both ‘Chineseness’ and Britishness, as well as what it means to be adopted. These experiences are situated within the limited UK research on BC adoptees and broader US scholarship and are analysed using postcolonial and critical race theory to show how BC adoptee identities are shaped by colonial legacies, racial hierarchies, and everyday encounters with otherness. While not claiming a singular truth, this study amplifies the voices of one of the last generations of BC adoptees following China’s cessation of overseas adoption, bringing to light experiences that challenge binary notions of race, culture, and belonging and offer new insights into identity in postcolonial Britain.