Race & Embryo Personhood
Image: Screenshot from Personhood USA video of anti-abortion protesters marching in Washington, D.C.
Writing |
An article (currently in revision) entitled "Racial Politics of Frozen Embryo Personhood in the U.S. Antiabortion Movement" examines how a branch of the U.S. antiabortion movement uses histories of racist oppression and movements for racial justice to advocate for the legal recognition of embryos as persons. Based on an examination of legal cases, promotional campaigns, and personal narratives from within the White-led movement for embryo personhood, this article argues that the recent wave of personhood activism revitalizes racial classifications and ideas about racial essences.
In February 2018, I participated in the wonderful Wenner-Gren Foundation workshop “Interrogating the Intersections of Race and Reproduction in Medicine, Science, and Technology" where I shared work based on ethnographic research within Christian embryo adoption programs. I prepared the article "Race and Personhood in US Embryo Adoption" (currently in revision) for our special issue on race and reproduction. It examines how embryo adoption professionals and participants confer ethnicity to frozen embryos and foster racial imaginaries about future children, which I suggest implicate essentialist notions of race in the promotion of embryo personhood.
In November 2017, I joined an inspiring panel of scholars at the annual American Anthropological Association meetings to discuss Reproductive Politics in the Age of Trump and Brexit. My talk, "Familiar Grammars: Saving as a Keyword in Trump's America," looked at the seamless interface between antiabortion and anti-immigrant policy to argue that saving as a de/valuing process figures centrally within reproductive politics under the current administration. Proceedings from this panel are currently in revision for publication.
In February 2018, I participated in the wonderful Wenner-Gren Foundation workshop “Interrogating the Intersections of Race and Reproduction in Medicine, Science, and Technology" where I shared work based on ethnographic research within Christian embryo adoption programs. I prepared the article "Race and Personhood in US Embryo Adoption" (currently in revision) for our special issue on race and reproduction. It examines how embryo adoption professionals and participants confer ethnicity to frozen embryos and foster racial imaginaries about future children, which I suggest implicate essentialist notions of race in the promotion of embryo personhood.
In November 2017, I joined an inspiring panel of scholars at the annual American Anthropological Association meetings to discuss Reproductive Politics in the Age of Trump and Brexit. My talk, "Familiar Grammars: Saving as a Keyword in Trump's America," looked at the seamless interface between antiabortion and anti-immigrant policy to argue that saving as a de/valuing process figures centrally within reproductive politics under the current administration. Proceedings from this panel are currently in revision for publication.