1. Technologies of the Gendered Body: Week 10

2. Presentations Groups of 4-5 Focusing on up to three images / articles / ads / published reports etc Critical discussion Draw from across the module (with reference to the literature) Powerpoint 15 minutes of presentation; 5 minutes for questions

3. Outline What are the new reproductive technologies? Resisting IVF NRTs as disciplinary technologies Procedure / process Surveilling female bodies Creating new desires Creating new objects / subjects Rethinking resistance

4. What are “new reproductive technologies”?

5. Resisting IVF Many people (feminist and non-feminst) have opposed IVF – why?)

6. NRTs as disciplinary technologies Biopower is reflected in the “numerous and diverse techniques for achieving the subjugation of bodies and the control of populations” (Foucault, 1978: 140) Power is “everywhere; not because it embraces everything, but because it comes from everywhere” (ibid. : 93)

7. Jana Sawicki (1991) “Disciplinary technologies are not primarily repressive mechanisms. In other words, they do not operate primarily through violence against or seizure of women’s bodies or bodily processes, but rather by producing new objects and subjects of knowledge, by inciting and channelling desires, generating and focusing individual and group energies, and establishing bodily norms and techniques for observing, monitoring and controlling bodily movements, processes and capacities. Disciplinary technologies control the body through techniques that simultaneously render it more useful, more powerful and more docile.” (p. 83)

8. Jana Sawicki (1991) “Disciplinary practices represent the body as a machine. They aim to render the individual both more power, productive, useful and docile. They are located within institutions such as hospitals, schools, and prisons, but also at the microlevel of society in the everyday activities and habits of individuals. They secure their hold not through the threat of violence or force, but rather by creating desires, attaching individuals to specific identities, and establishing norms against which individuals and their behaviours and bodies are judged and against which they police themselves.” (p. 68)

9. Processes / Procedures A laboratory procedure A process of assisted conception

10. Surveillance of women’s bodies Pre-pregnancy preparation (e.g. pre-natal vitamins) Monitoring of women during pregnancy Public (and self-) surveillance of pregnant women Self-monitoring (basal body temp; ovulation kits; pregnancy tests; measuring of hormones) Close monitoring of women undergoing IVF (to check for ovarian hyperstimulation syndrome / follicle maturity / uterine wall thickness) Genetic testing (of parents; of foetuses; of embryos)

11. Creating new desires

12. Creating new objects / subjects

14. Creating new obejcts / subjects

15. Creating new objects / subjects The (post) IVF patient Claire: “I can say “At least I tried”. So there can be no stage in the future when I might say to myself, “Oh well, if only I’d tried, it could have been different”. Erm…it’s almost like I can say to society, “look, I tried to be the typical female, I tried to be the mother, you know, but it conspired against me, so I now have the right to go off and spend my money on nice holidays or whatever and don’t feel guilty.” (Throsby 2006: 84)

16. Creating new subjects The post-IVF fertile body: Angela: “Then I was on 6 ampoules, erm, produced 22 eggs…no, there were 22 of the little sacs, 21 eggs – and none fertilised”. June: “I didn’t consider myself infertile, but I didn’t know what was happening as well…It only takes on egg to get fertilised, so I didn’t consider myself to be infertile”. (Throsby 2006: 88)

17. Creating new objects / subjects The post-IVF infertile body: John: “No it’s like “Do you have any children?” I say, “Well, no, unfortunately, my couldn’t have any. We’ve tried, but we couldn’t”. (Throsby and Gill 2004: 338)

18. Rethinking resistance

19. (prospective) patient action: Fighting for funding / treatment Strategic half-truths (about smoking / relationship / how long they’ve been “trying”) Within relationships – persuasion / negotiation to circumvent resistance Using genetic testing to select for a disability

20. But… Important not to overstate this agency: Active role exposes women to blame when it fails Ongoing pressures on (some) women to be mothers Some very worrying examples of coercion: Contraceptive implants / sterilisations The “sharing” of eggs for the treatment of others (or for research) in exchange for reduced cost treatment

21. Conclusion Kathy Davis (about cosmetic surgery) (1995: 180): It should be seen as “a dilemma rather than as a form of self-inflected subordination”. This is “what makes it both desirable and problematic for women”.