CAA welcomes you to join our special event
Side By Side Documentary Film Screening (Adoptee-Only)
With filmmaker Glenn Morey, and therapist Laura X. Williams, MA, LMFT, LAC
Join us Tuesday, March 5, 2024 7:30-9:30pm ET
WHEN:
WHERE:
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Virtual - Register by Tuesday, March 5, 7:29PM to receive the Zoom link and password to the event.
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Free for adoptee members; $10 for adoptee non-members.
WHO:
Since this topic is relatable to many transracial and intercountry adoptees, we expect a large turnout, and we hope to see you there!
Become a Virtual Member ($18) to receive free/discounted entry to future events as well as our community newsletter! This will help us continue to make events like this possible.
RSVP at linktr.ee/chineseadopteealliance for the Zoom link. If you have any questions, please emailevents@chineseadopteealliance.org.
We look forward to connecting with you all this winter season! See you soon!
~ CAA Virtual Events Committee ~
About the Event:
Glenn’s Bio:
Glenn Morey is co-director of the documentary film project, Side by Side, presenting the stories of 100 adult Korean adoptees—filmed in 7 countries, 16 cities, and 6 languages. “Side by Side: Out of a South Korean Orphanage and Into the World” won the Gold Jury Award for Best Short Documentary at the Social Justice Film Festival, and was an Official Selection of the San Diego Asian Film Festival, Boston Asian American Film Festival, Dumbo Film Festival, and others. In 2019, Side by Side was adapted as a New York Times Op Doc, “Given Away,” as well as a 12-screen video art installation that exhibited in Seoul and New York City. Side by Side has now been adapted as an Audible Original audiobook also titled, “Given Away,” and Glenn has been featured on NPR’s All Things Considered and Morning Edition.
Laura’s Bio:
Laura X. Williams, MA, LMFT, LAC, is a Chinese American Transracial Adoptee and grew up in New Jersey as an only child. She continues to explore her multifaceted heritage and identity ever since she was a teenager. She has always been a cat person :) Starting in studies of sociology, public health, and folklore, Laura practices relational psychotherapy in Denver, CO and is a community organizer with Asian Vibes in Denver. She also loves playing trombone in between working as a marriage and family therapist, addiction counselor, and/or sex therapist.
Event:
Filmmaker, Glenn Morey, will screen the award-winning short documentary, Side by Side: Out of a South Korean Orphanage and Into the World, featuring the stories of 9 Korean-born, inter-country adoptees and composed entirely of intensely intimate first-person narratives, filmed in Seattle, Chicago, Boston, New York City, Paris, Stockholm, Amsterdam, and Melbourne—stories of a baby violently thrown from a car at an orphanage front door, being given away to a total stranger in a train station, the identity issues of feeling like a “Martian,” the complexities of being gay and a Korean-American adoptee, reuniting with birth parents and trying to make sense of relationships with mothers and fathers they’ve never known.
Glenn will speak to the project’s scope, intention, and methodology. He will be joined by Laura X. Williams to discuss the impact of Side by Side on adoptees and adoptive families, and its role in mental healthcare and social work. For many adoptees, our journey requires processing and talking about those parts of our stories that are hard to acknowledge even to ourselves, let alone to others. Glenn and Laura will explore the fraught terrain of our most closely held and rarely revealed feelings—fear, shame, anger, alienation, and more—through the lenses of clinical work with adoptees and the raw and unfiltered adoptee stories of Side by Side.
Sneak peak of the film:
"Inter-country adoption, as we think of it today, started in South Korea. By the end of the Korean War, two million infants and children had been separated from their families of origin. From then to today, some 180,000 have been adopted...to the US, Sweden, the Netherlands, France, Australia, and a dozen others. This project is about telling that story. Through our eyes. Our memories. Our origins in Korea. Our experiences in our adoptive families, in our adoptive countries. There have now been more than 60 years of inter-country adoption out of South Korea, setting the precedent for millions of adoptions out of many other countries. Stories like these help us better understand this very singular human experience."
