berghahn New York · Oxford

Contents

Boxes
Foreword
Acknowledgements

Introduction

Chapter 1. Locating Conceiving Kinship: New Subjects, New Boundaries

Introduction
An Overview of Anthropological Enquiry into Assisted Conception
An Overview of Italian Anthropology

Chapter 2. Research in Place: Shifting Fields of Enquiry

Introduction
Multiple Investigations, Sites, Informants
Main Investigation
Comparative Investigation
Collateral Investigation

Chapter 3. Heterosexual Couples: Life Plans, Irreversible Infertility and the Choice of a Programme of Gamete Donation

A Case: Anna and Artificial Insemination by Donor
Introduction
Planning Our Life, Planning Our Children
Discovering Irreversible Infertility
Choosing a Programme of Gamete Donation
Normalizing Gamete Donation
Do It Quickly (and It Lasts Forever)

Chapter 4. Heterosexual Couples: Gamete Donation, Donors and Biogenetic Make-up

A Case: Matilde and Egg Donation
Introduction
Infertile Couples, Biological Inheritance and Biogenetic Make-up
Couples' Perception of Donors and Donation
Good Intentions, Gifts and Donors' Displacement

Chapter 5. Heterosexual Couples and Clinicians: Strategies in Private Clinics of Assisted Conception

Extract from Field Notes: at Lunch with Clinicians
Introduction
The Provision of Services in Private Clinics of Assisted Conception
Life around Clinics and Clinicians: Trust, Faith and Dependency
The Hyper-medicalized Infertile Couple
Managing Recurrent Failure in the Clinic
Getting to Understand Programmes of Gamete Donation
The Work of Kinship in the Clinic

Chapter 6. Lesbian and Gay Couples Making Families by Donation

A Case: a Lesbian Couple Planning a Family by Donation
Introduction
Lesbian and Gay Couples: Planning a Life Together
Planning Families
Rethinking Motherhood and Fatherhood
The Lesbian and Gay Way: The Procreative Project
The Lesbian and Gay Way: Practices of Inclusion
The Lesbian and Gay Way: Practices of Relatedness

Chapter 7. The Traffic in Kinship: Southern Europe and Euro-America

Introduction
Ethnographic Reflections: Some Key Notions
Programmes of Gamete Donation: Challenging (in Principle) the 'Model' Italian versus Euro-American Kinship: Generalizing the 'Model'

A Concluding Note: Conceiving Kinship

Appendix I: Assisted Conception in Italy: A Legislative and Political Controversy, 1996-99

Towards a Unified Text: Political Controversies over Legislation
The Death of the Unified Text: The Rise of a New Controversy
The Political Project Behind Assisted Conception, 1996-99

Appendix II: Profile of Infertile Heterosexual Couples

Appendix IIa: Profile of Lesbian and Gay Couples

Bibliography
Index

Conceiving Kinship

Assisted Conception, Procreation and Family in Southern Europe

Monica M. E. Bonaccorso

176 pages, 10 illus., bibliog., index

ISBN 978-1-84545-112-7 Hb Published (October 2008)

eISBN 978-1-84545-867-6 eBook

Details

“…a fine example of how an anthropological approach, based on skilful ethnographic research, can illuminate the way kinship and family are understood in present-day culture…[The book] is an exemplary ethnography, building on previous works in this area and making advances in both methodology and theory.” · Social Anthropology/Anthropologie sociale

"Conceiving Kinship provides intriguing and important insights into a period of rapid and unregulated development in assisted conception in Italy in the late 1990s. The book draws us into detailed and sensitive accounts of couples' intentions, assumptions and actions during a time of shifting expectations about parenthood and the ways that one might become a parent. Rich interview and conversational material is gathered from heterosexual as well as homosexual couples in relation to a wide range of assisted conception scenarios. This detailed ethnographic fieldwork, combined with a sustained analytical interrogation, makes for a significant contribution to the complex mosaic of practices and values which lie beneath the Euro-American kinship label. It is one which will become an important reference point for future debates about assisted conception in Europe and beyond." · Robert Simpson, Reader, University of Durham

Conceiving Kinship is an in-depth journey, the first of its kind, into how heterosexual, lesbian and gay couples using programmes of gamete donation conceptualize and make Italian kinship. It explores the provision of treatment in clinical and non-clinical settings at a time when Italy was considered the 'Wild-West' of assisted conception. This compelling study provides a new perspective on hotly debated issues in kinship studies and the modern medical technologies; it offers fresh insights into longstanding questions of cultural continuities and discontinuities in European kinship.

Monica M.E. Bonaccorso is Lecturer in Social Anthropology at the University of Durham, following a position as Affiliated Lecturer and Wellcome Trust Fellow in the Department of Social Anthropology at the University of Cambridge.

Series: Volume 9, Fertility, Reproduction and Sexuality: Social and Cultural Perspectives

Subject: Medical Anthropology Gender Studies and Sexuality

Area: Southern Europe

LC: RG133.5 .B66 2009

BL: YC.2013.a.14177

BISAC: SOC002010 SOCIAL SCIENCE/Anthropology/Cultural & Social; MED082000 MEDICAL/Reproductive Medicine & Technology; SOC002000 SOCIAL SCIENCE/Anthropology/General

BIC: PSXM Medical anthropology; JFSJ1 Gender studies: women