In Memory: Annette Baran
Annette Baran. Photo courtesy of YouTube.
Social worker, psychotherapist and National Association of Social Workers member Annette Baran revolutionized the world of adoption.
Beginning in the 1950s Baran, ACSW, was director of adoptions at what was formerly called Visa Del Mar Child-Care Service in West Los Angeles. According to this obituary in the Los Angeles Times adoptions then were closed, with adoptive parents and adoptees not given information about or contact with birth parents.
However, Baran began to change her mind about this practice when a birth mother wanted to interview the adopted parents before relinquishing her child. Baran arranged the meeting without her agency knowing.
“And I sat there listening to the three of them,” Baran said in this interview posted on YouTube. “And I thought there is nothing wrong with this. This is really pretty good. Why does everything have to be this secret? What is all that nonsense about?”
Baran went on to become of the nation’s leading advocates for open adoptions and co-author of “The Adoption Triangle,” a 1978 book that helped shaped the open adoption movement.
Baran died on July 11 at age 83 from complications from an infection. However, her legacy lives on.
The research from Baran and others proved adopted people who are connected to birth families feel more normal and whole and birth parents are relieved of lingering anxiety over what happened to the children they gave up.
“She became the Joan of Arc of open adoption,” her son Joshua said. “To the adoptees, she was their hero. At conferences, they would cheer her and weep.”
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I am suprised that I am the first to comment 🙁 Annette Baran was a Social Work legend. Not only was she a supporter of Adoption Reform, she also backed the Adoptee Rights Movement–something every single social worker that believes in the right to self-determination and equality of adopted people, should get behind. My NASW chapter supports it, the CWLA supports it, everyone, everywhere should support it.
God bless Annette for all of her hard work and advocacy.
I met Annette Baran when I was thirteen years old. I had been adopted and I was struggling with many of the issues that accompany adoption. This was in the 1970’s and the push for allowing adoptees access to their birth information was just beginning. Annette was the first person I encountered that validated my feelings and told me there was nothing wrong with wanting to know my family history. I spent every Monday afternoon with Annette for three years. During that time I learned so much from her and for the first time in my life, I no longer felt alone on my journey. Thank you, Annette!!!