Interconnected Experiences and Bodies in US Surrogacy

Abstract

Surrogacy is a practice that requires the participation of multiple social actors: sperm and/or egg donors, intended parents (IPs) and gestational carriers (GCs). The data were collected during a research on US surrogacy conducted in Southern California between September 2017 and January 2020. The study involved IPs, GCs and the clinical and hospital staffs of a fertility clinic and six hospitals. In this contribution, I will read surrogacy as a sophisticated interweaving of relationships (Berend, 2016a) that is activated thanks to the support of artificial reproductive technologies (ARTs). I will analyze the surrogacy pregnancy not exclusively as an organic process, but, following Elly Teman (2009) and Zsuzsa Berend (2016a) insights, I will read it as a choral project shaped by all the actors directly or indirectly involved in it. I will show which rituals are practiced during the surrogacy pathway, and in particular, I will pay attention to some specific aspects that are invested by particular meaning such as ultrasounds, rooming-in, breastfeeding and the ‘skin-to-skin’ practice.

Citation

Guerzoni, C.S. (2022), "Interconnected Experiences and Bodies in US Surrogacy", Guerzoni, C.S. and Mattalucci, C. (Ed.) Reproductive Governance and Bodily Materiality (Emerald Studies in Reproduction, Culture and Society), Emerald Publishing Limited, Leeds, pp. 57-72. https://doi.org/10.1108/978-1-80071-438-020221007