Author: Ann Waltner

Format: Hardcover

Getting an Heir is a study of adoption centering on the practice of adoption in the Tang/Song/Ming dynasties. Per Waltner’s analysis, adoption in late medieval China involved finding suitable heirs (as the title suggests) to carry on the family line etc., but importantly, these heirs would be expected to take care of the ancestral rites for the entire family lineage. This is the core of adoption in China (though Waltner does mention that there existed e.g. benevolent adoptions etc.) and informs cultural attitudes and legal frameworks surrounding the practice.

Getting an Heir is clearly a PhD thesis (or something of that nature) turned into a book, which means that it is extremely focused and does not make any particularly interesting large claims about Chinese society and adoption - in particular, Waltner focuses on the prescribed restriction on adoption that one should (ideally) only adopt people from within the clan (i.e. with the same surname). The vast majority of the book is dedicated to exploring exactly how much this restriction held in reality and the various ways in which this restriction was flaunted (including, in particular, through uxorilocal marriage - a marriage where the husband joins the wife’s family rather than the reverse). Naturally, the book does touch on some interesting gender / class divides in Chinese society, but only in passing. There is also an oddly large emphasis on cultural attitudes as portrayed through contemporaneous fiction - an entire one of the four total chapters is devoted solely to depictions of adoption in fiction and Waltner relies heavily on fiction to flesh out claims about cultural acceptance or non-acceptance of types of adoption. I personally would’ve liked the book to dive deeper into specific historical details outside of fiction; for example, the introduction of the book begins with a discussion of a minor revolt against a Ming dynasty emperor due to his refusal to be adopted as the past emperor’s son. Also the book is in Wade-Giles which always makes my head hurt.