EASA 2014: Collaboration, Intimacy & Revolution: innovation and continuity in an interconnected world

Rethinking assisted conception: dynamics of law, morality and religion (P106)

Tallinn, 31st July - 3rd August, 2014

Panel Abstract

In the last decades many insightful studies gave evidence on how assisted reproductive technologies (ARTs) allow for the formation of new intimacies, and on the work necessary to circumscribe those relationships that count as kinship. Influenced by Schneider's critique, these studies have largely focused on questioning the seemingly natural‚ principles of human reproduction.

By explicitly focusing on dynamics of law, morality and religion, the proposed panel shifts the spotlight on the structures and principles embedded in the social uses of reproductive technologies. What moral, theological and juridical logics underlie the concepts of kinship that move people when they turn to - or refrain from - certain technologies of assisted conception? And how are they contested and negotiated?

We hope to discuss these and other questions in order to develop an understanding of reproductive technologies as means by which societies seek to guarantee social continuity.

We welcome empirically or theoretically informed papers that do not shy away from reading across these domains. Topics might include but are not limited to: How can we conceptualize the relationship between science, morality and religion in the age of biotechnologies? How do people relate to religion as a resource to cope with vulnerability? How do lay people and experts use moral claims to justify or challenge fertility regimes and exclusions? And do new forms of social dynamics thereby emerge? What notions of belonging and proximity do such claims express?

Convenors: Sibylle Lustenberger (University of Bern) and Shirin Garmaroudi Naef (University of Zurich)

Submissions: Deadline 27.02.2014

All submission should be made online at: http://www.nomadit.co.uk/easa/easa2014/panels.php5?PanelID=3029