Those that Fly: Michaela DePrince and the Transnational Politics of Rescue

Abstract:This article analyzes Taking Flight, a memoir written by former African war-orphan-turned-ballerina Michaela DePrince with her white adoptive mother Elaine DePrince. Through an analysis of DePrince’s narrative, this article seeks to lay out how the privileged international movement of African youths uncomfortably aligns with more violent forms of inter and intra-national movement, including child soldiering as well as the shutting down of borders to other racialized children who do not meet the ideological requirements implied by discourses of childhood innocence. By thinking through the acceptance and rejection of black and racialized children across borders, this article will not only interrogate the Western framework of humanitarianism but also explore how the subjective formations of a rescued African child can either challenge or be contained in service of the hegemonic terminology of human rights that makes her movement possible.