Éléments pour une analyse de la fraternité d’accueil dans un contexte de circulation des enfants

Abstract

If the host family indeed seems to be a protective device for children, it can also be understood as a particular form of family recomposition: the children placed there maintain ties with their family of origin and establish ties with the maternal assistant, her spouse and his children. This way “of forming a family” differs from recompositions following the breakup of a fecund union, since it is the children who are joined to another family, and not an in-law. Vis-à-vis the host family, it nonetheless remains true that with respect to the host family’s children, the placed children are in a situation resembling that of foster brothers and sisters of recomposed families in the sense that they do not blood relatives. Hence, it is possible to analyze the bonds they may establish as fraternal, and that much more so in that they live together on a daily basis, which is seldom the case of foster brothers and sisters. Basing ourselves on recent works on multi-parentality and recomposed fraternity, the author proposes taking another look at family placement in privileging the angle of the host foster family, and to do this in a context presenting the particularity of having a tradition of circulation of children: the society of the île de la Réunion.