The Elusive Embryo: How Women and Men Approach New Reproductive Technologies / Edition 1

by Gay Becker

Overview

In the first book to examine the industry of reproductive technology from the perspective of the consumer, Gay Becker scrutinizes the staggering array of medical options available to women and men with fertility problems and assesses the toll—both financial and emotional—that the quest for a biological child often exacts from would-be parents. Becker interviewed hundreds of people over a period of years; their stories are presented here in their own words. Absorbing, informative, and in many cases moving, these stories address deep-seated notions about gender, self-worth, and the cultural ideal of biological parenthood. Becker moves beyond people's personal experiences to examine contemporary meanings of technology and the role of consumption in modern life. What emerges is a clear view of technology as culture, with technology the template on which issues such as gender, nature, and the body are being rewritten and continuously altered.

The Elusive Embryo chronicles the history and development of reproductive technology, and shows how global forces in consumer culture have contributed to the industry's growth. Becker examines how increasing use of reproductive technology has changed ideas about "natural" pregnancy and birth. Discussing topics such as in vitro fertilization, how men and women "naturalize" the use of a donor, and what happens when new reproductive technologies don't work, Becker shows how the experience of infertility has become increasingly politicized as potential parents confront the powerful forces that shape this industry. The Elusive Embryo is accessible, well written, and well documented. It will be an invaluable resource for people using or considering new reproductive technologies as well as for social scientists and health professionals.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780520224315
Publisher:	University of California Press
Publication date:	12/20/2000
Edition description:	First Edition
Pages:	330
Product dimensions:	6.00(w) x 9.00(h) x 0.80(d)

About the Author

Gay Becker is Professor of Medical Anthropology and Social and Behavioral Sciences and an investigator at the Institute for Health and Aging at the University of California, San Francisco. She is the author of Disrupted Lives: How People Create Meaning in a Chaotic World (California, 1997), Healing the Infertile Family: Strengthening Your Relationship in the Search for Parenthood (California, 1997), and Growing Old in Silence (California, 1980).

Read an Excerpt

Chapter 4

Genes and Generations

We had this unfortunate thing happen to us. We're not able to create a family. We're not able to fulfill the second half, or the third part, of the American dream. It just seems terribly un-American.

Tanya, thirty-five years old

When my sister was alive, my brother-in-law had a vasectomy. And they chose not to have any children. Not an easy decision. My husband's brother is disabled and very unlikely to ever marry or have children. Those are the only kids. This is it. We are it. And so there's this "generations" concern. You're not only not producing another child, but you are the only one who could possibly produce a grandchild. And you also feel like there is some terrible sense of not going into the future. Just this lack of regeneration and new life. A feeling of going on into your old age and a kind of longing for that [regeneration of self]. I also think you feel totally isolated. It's ironic. Everyone's out there: "Family family family!" I think you have this terrible sense of isolation and loss.

Alicia, forty-three years old

The discovery of infertility leads women and men to question a lifetime of assumptions about how the world is ordered. Beliefs about biology, reproductive potential, gender roles, definitions of family and kin, the meaning of being a person, explanations of how the world works—all are torn down. Tanya goes to the heart of the matter when she bemoans the loss of the "American dream." Having children is taken for granted by most people in the United States, but Tanya and her husband don't fit in. Her articulation of an "outsider" experience reflects how troubling unwanted childlessness can be: it creates a profound sense of disorder in Tanya's life. When women and men engage with new reproductive technologies in an effort to conceive, they do so in an effort to reestablish order in their lives, to reclaim their right to be American and to everything that identity signifies.

I think of myself as a "good person." It [infertility] goes against the way I've interpreted life so far. In a way it's been easy for me to interpret life so far because I've led a—I don't want to say a charmed life—but I've gotten off pretty okay. Haven't had physical problems, never been sick, very loving parents, of means, you know, middle-class, done well in school, gotten by, had good jobs, all that stuff. I don't want to say that I haven't struggled, because I always worked hard to get what I want, but I haven't had troubles with a capital T. So this is for me a profound period of deep struggle.

Steven's sense of coherence has been disturbed because this event does not fit the context of his life—"a charmed life"-and his sense of who he is, "a good person." Steven is Jewish, but his invocation of an element of the so-called Protestant ethic, hard work, to explain his past success illustrates how dominant ideologies in the United States that were formerly attributed to religion are instead class-based (Steven identifies with the middle class). (note 11) Steven's new uncertainty about the future is playing havoc with his sense of coherence. In trying to explain this disruption, Steven uses the rationale that misfortune will help him to build character, a perspective that is embedded in the U.S. cultural ideology of self-determination. (note 12) Unable to make sense of his dilemma through traditional explanatory systems of understanding, Steven identifies this period of his life as one of "deep struggle." REPRODUCTION AS NATURAL ORDER

The families I am concerned with in this book are heterosexual couples who intend to have children, a model that continues to dominate cultural dialogues on the family in the United States and that represents the cultural norm. As Jane Collier and Sylvia Yanagisako observe, the U.S. folk model of reproduction contains the underlying "assumption that 'male' and 'female' are two natural categories of human beings whose relationships are everywhere structured by their biological difference." (note 14) Biologically driven kinship continues to dominate the view of families in the United States despite anthropological analyses that demonstrate that kinship is a symbolic system, not a natural system. (note 15) Kinship with others is based either on blood ties or on marital ties. Of the two, blood ties are seen as more binding. Yet the idea of what constitutes a family has recently undergone major expansion, as increased numbers of families are headed by gay couples, single parents, and grandparents and other relatives. (note 16) And families are no longer defined simply by the presence of children. Large numbers of childless couples have led to increased recognition that families come in many forms.

I've been going back to that experience at the infertility workshop we told you about. There's a spiritual omen to that: what is the meaning of life? What are we doing here? Are we just animals that are reproducing our DNA? Or are there other things that are as important, if not maybe more important, in life? These are multifaceted and complex questions, and most people never get past it.... A lot of people don't get past being intelligent animals. It's sort of sad to see. I saw three men who doubted their masculinity because they were not able to father their child. I've never been in a group of men where there's been more raw emotion expressed than in that workshop. Men are usually reserved and reasonable and stuff, but I saw more pain openly demonstrated, talked about, and more tears in that experience with men than in any other experience I've ever had with other men. A man thinks that because his sperm doesn't have active flagella that he's not a human being? Not a man? Incredible! Others think he must not have a soul? He must not think he has any meaning beyond that. That's pretty sad.

This discussion illustrates how science-based models alter explanations and meanings of things. Brad suggests that the acceptance of science models has confused how people think about natural order and about themselves. He then unwittingly demonstrates this mixture of models. He questions the science metaphor of people as animals, yet he then applies the metaphor to his fellow workshop participants. He pits the science model against the meaning of life and suggests there is a "spiritual omen" about biological reductionism. He also addresses the assault of components of the science model (sperm with active flagella) on men's sense of masculinity, and ultimately, on their humanness. In doing so, he demonstrates that cultural notions of order in the universe are implicit.

Trained as an evolutionary biologist, I feel like I wouldn't date just anyone. You know, I dated women that I really liked, and respected, and admired. But I wouldn't want to just throw my sperm in with any old egg, either. I believe in not just selection and people, but animals, plants, all choosing their mates, and so picking an anonymous mate sort of goes against this long-term scholastic training. And more than that, it's a personal philosophy. It's really how I think. So it's part of the reason why I have trouble with adoption. It's this same sort of issue. You know, I want that lineage.

Although he attributes his ideas about natural selection to scholastic training, Hank also acknowledges them as a "personal philosophy." Natural selection is part of his explanation of how the world works. His desire for "lineage" and everything it signifies is related to this belief. This stance upholds a patriarchal perspective on reproduction, although that is not Hank's intent. His stance does not augur well for the couple's becoming parents. He acknowledges that he and his wife are approaching the problem from different perspectives:

But we're at a different place here because I'm not having the fertility problem right now. I'm approaching it and probably feeling about it differently....I have different issues than she does, who is facing her own infertility. And I think that colors it a bit, how we look at this, and the way we approach it. It really does shade how you approach it. As far as we know, I'm fertile right now and I have an infinite number of possibilities ahead of me, whereas she doesn't. So that's one thing. The other thing that we talked about is that we came to the recognition that everything we've done up to this point has been really easy. That has been the stuff that we always wanted, which was her egg, my sperm.

For Hank the early stages of medical treatment for infertility have been "easy" because they involved the couple's own biological material. Egg and sperm are cultural icons that signify manhood and womanhood. (note 20) Joining them together signifies the conjunction of cultural ideals. In the face of declining hopes of having a biological child, Hank clings to these ideals because they represent more than the "facts of life"—they represent culture as he knows it, a way of life. What remains unspoken in Hank's comments is whether he would prefer to stand by these cultural ideals, and forgo parenthood altogether than to raise a child he might not view as truly "his."

EMBODIED GENES

Biological determinism in the United States has expressed itself in a wide range of contexts. It has been the basis of justifications for racist views, rationales for intelligence testing, and arguments against adoption. (note 21) In particular, these ideas have been represented in eugenics movements. The emphasis on "parental worthiness" at the beginning of the twentieth century led to a campaign for mandatory sterilization of those who were thought to be unfit. Views of African Americans and other people of color as inferior fueled this movement through much of the century. (note 22)

There are milestones [in life]. I mean, marriage was a milestone, being in the Army, university, traveling. Different things were milestones. But there is no kind of societal milestone, like, you know, you're finally grown up. Someone gives you this certificate. But I think I've had a sense somehow that when I will be a father I will have a sense of that connection, that kind of lineage through the generations. Coming from my father, my grandfather, my mother, her side of the family kind of coming through me. And the sense of "Well, now I'm the parent." And I'm responsible, rather than this kind of, uh, it's almost this kind of limbo thing that I'm not...I'm no longer a child. That is very obvious to me, and, at the same time, there's something tangible that's missing. I don't know if it's a manifestation through a child. But that's part of it.

David voices several cultural expectations about family creation and parenting that are widely shared among people experiencing infertility: first, the idea that a series of milestones lead up to parenthood; second, the feeling of limbo when parenthood does not occur, and David feels that he is neither a child any longer nor yet a full-fledged adult; (note 25) and third, the loss of generational continuity, of passing on traditions from one's forebears to the next generation. David's feeling that something tangible is missing, the manifestation of these experiences through a child, was expressed in one way or another by everyone in this study. His conclusion that parenting is an "adopted" responsibility underscores the essence of his statement: parenthood, along with other cultural expectations, gives definition to adulthood.

I have this feeling that when I become a parent things will fall into place. I have this desire to connect with others in community, and that comes from a place that would normally go to a child, if a child were there. It's not like I don't have a purpose. But I'm really aware of not feeling...I grew up feeling unconnected to my father but I somehow feel that by having a child I will somehow feel more grounded and somehow feel that lineage that came through my great-grandfather, my grandfather, my father, kind of through me, and goes on through the child. And somehow now I'm on the end of this sword. Like a fencing sword, so it's like I'm on the tip of it and it's kind of moving around, and I'm kind of moving around. I'm in this kind of limbo space. And there's nothing forcing the end of the sword to stand still. And if I had a child I guess I would feel like that would stabilize. But it's not like I walk around saying, "Woe is me, I don't have a purpose in life because I don't have a child."

David again expresses his sense of limbo and a desire to feel "grounded." His image of a wavering sword is a powerful metaphor for limbo. He juxtaposes this image with a desire for stability, which he equates with community and assumes that a child would provide.

I notice every time I say it, the linkage of the generations, that I say my father and his father and my dad, and maybe I'm making an assumption that I'm going to have a male child. But I don't know if it's as a man or as a human being. I mean, it's hard for me to differentiate between the two. I've never been a locker room kind of guy. I can't say that there's any kind of thing that goes into that that makes it difficult. But out in society, and oh, just being at a point where I would like to be a father, I think.

Although David is unsure about what he thinks specifically about a male child, it is clear that parenting has a definite set of cultural meanings in connecting him to other men—both to his father and the male line in his family and to other men his own age. When he reports feeling jealous and left out, he echoes another dominant theme among women and men who are dealing with infertility.

I think that another issue that has come up for me since the miscarriage, the fact that I'm a woman in his [husband's] family and I'm not productive, and he's a male, and "What if no one can carry on the line?" You know, the lineage and the name that goes with it. His sister-in-law's baby, it was another girl, so now there's two girls in the family.

Angela raises the same concerns as David did about lineage and the family line, and particularly about continuing the male line. David himself acknowledges that his thoughts keep returning to his male forebears. He never mentions carrying on his wife's line: his concerns relate solely to his own family. And although Angela uses the women in her own family as the measure of her gender performance, it is carrying on her husband's line that concerns her. Patriarchal imperatives underlie both women's and men's efforts to conceive a biological child. While David's feelings of being an outsider are based on comparisons to other men, Angela raises the same questions with respect to other women. Dialogues about gender and dialogues about kinship are inextricably connected.

I am not the kind of person that really romanticizes pregnancy. With my surgical history and my age, I already know that it will be a C-section. My doctor has told me. But I don't romanticize the physical discomfort. In our support group we have met women where carrying the baby is so important to them and going through the birth process. And for me, I want to be a parent, that is what excites me, so I can give that up, the pregnancy part, easily. The genetic part, I actually can give that up too, in a way, because first of all, I don't think that I have such great genes, and I think when I fantasize of a child, I don't think of a little Ashley. I think of a little Scott, and I kind of fantasize all of his great qualities and I hope it has red hair and I hope that it is good in math, and I hope that it has this easy-going disposition, so I kind of imagine a little Scott.

As she tries to enumerate what is important to her, it emerges that the biological connection is important to Ashley, but it is her husband's genes she is concerned with, not hers. But Ashley, like many other women in this study who were unsuccessful in becoming pregnant, mourned the loss of being able to see her partner in a child, thus asserting the connection between patriarchy and biology. This tendency could be viewed as a desire simply to reproduce the partner. Men in this study, however, did not make the same comment. Men who were considering donor insemination hoped that the child would at least look like one of them or stated a wish for the wife to experience a pregnancy, but they did not talk about the wish to see specific physical features of the partner reproduced. Maintaining the biological lineage through a child that is not only biologically related but that visibly resembles the father may reinforce patriarchy.

So I think that whole genetic thing is really a bunch of crap. You get what you get, and in terms of the bonding, I have known friends where it was their own child and they had trouble bonding with it. And so I think that instant bonding is a myth. And I think that if you want to be a parent and you have longed for a child the way adoptive parents have, I think that maybe you even have a greater chance, if not as good a chance, of bonding with just a concept. So I don't worry about the bonding. I can give up the genes easily. I worry so about the child being accepted into the family in terms of the grandparents. You know, not having that link of heritage. Of feeling this is our little line carrying on. So that seems like a little bit of a rough spot, but it feels far enough away that I am not too worried about it now.

Ashley firmly rejects the "myth" of instant bonding with a biological child, thus voicing a widespread assumption that is insidiously reinforced in the child-rearing literature read by the general public. Many women and men expressed fears that they would not be able to bond with a child who was not biologically "theirs," whether that child was adopted or was conceived with donor gametes. This concern was subsequently dismissed by everyone in our study who became parents of nonbiological children.

I don't feel all the things that Ashley does, so I just want to get that out. [To Ashley:] I thought what you said, you said very well, and a lot of the things that you did say I agree with. [Turning to interviewer:] Clearly whether I adopt a child or not, I am not going to go through, personally, the pregnancy, but I will not have any opportunity of going through the pregnancy with Ashley. And that, to me, does mean something to me. It will be a loss to me that I am going to have to deal with. I said in our discussion group at Resolve a couple of weeks ago, when I heard of my brother's first child being born, and the party they had, how powerful it was for me. And again, this was the first grandchild in our family, so that had special significance for my father and mother. But the whole process was bringing the child into the world was something. It was a journey. Not that there isn't a similar-or different- kind of adoption journey that you go through, and depending on your relationship with your birth mother, you can be present at the birth and all these things. I am learning all these things, and this excites me, too. But I am going to feel that loss if we don't do that [conceive themselves].

Scott's statement captures the cultural significance with which a birth is greeted, not only by the parents but by extended family members as well. Such experiences reinforce the cultural ideology of biological parenthood, which is symbolized by genes. Scott reaffirms his desire for his own and Ashley's genes, regardless of their quality. For Scott, his genes are embodied. He sees them as a way of sharing himself with the world, a form of community. This statement can be interpreted as a belief in his genetic superiority, or as communal feeling, or both these things. (note 26) However he intends it, Ashley takes issue with him:

Ashley: I just think that is bullshit.

To Scott, using his own genes to create a child has deeply rooted cultural meanings. Ashley, on the other hand, has detached herself from the cultural significance of parenting a biological child to focus on parenting without biology. Scott disagrees with Ashley's implication that this desire represents male egotism about the value of his genes.

I think the miracle of life, that is high. And that is what you heard at your brother's party. But that is what we hear from adoptive parents when they are witnessing the birth of their child because it is a miracle of life, and it is feeling some emotion attached to that miracle. It is not something that you are watching on TV. It is something that you have a relationship with.

Ashley delineates the critical social significance of the birth of a child, regardless of whether it is biological: having a relationship with the child, experiencing intense emotions about it. But once she has imagined the birth of a child, her bodily knowledge momentarily takes over, as she remembers the perils of unsuccessful pregnancies, both real and imagined. Scared by all the problems she foresees, she quickly rejects this possibility once again.

I am concerned about that. I think that my mom could love the child instantly whatever it was. My dad, I think, maybe intellectually could talk himself into it but might have some trouble on the emotional level. We talk about adoption, it is not like they...I haven't actually said to them, "What do you think about adoption?" But they supplied me with names of people they know, and they seem to be supportive of all that, and so I imagine that maybe their longing, just like our longing, kind of changes you and kind of breaks down some of those biases. But I do have some concerns because my dad can certainly be prejudiced, and I am not sure about a child of another race. I am not sure for us, but I am sure my dad would not accept that.

Scott, too, has concerns:

I am not sure if my parents would accept that, too. But I sort of let my parents know that we are considering adoption. I have not asked them, "What do you think?"

Ashley continues,

I think for me, I don't want to know. I feel like I am dealing with so much. I don't want the kibosh put on it early in the process.

Scott adds: "I feel the same way."

---

Chapter 4 Notes

1. In Barren in the Promised Land (140), Elaine Tyler May documents successive waves of pronatalism in the United States and their cultural roots. She calls the era in which most baby boomers were raised the "era of compulsory parenthood." back to text

2. This is the view of Margaret Clark and Barbara Anderson: see Clark and Anderson, Culture and Aging. back to text

3. For discussion of the relationship of values to memories, life experiences, and social ideologies, see Quinn, "Motivational Force"; Holland, "How Cultural Systems Become Desire"; and Claudia Strauss, "What Makes Tony Run?" back to text

4. For a discussion of the relationship between values and culturally specific direction, see D'Andrade, "Cultural Meaning Systems." For a discussion of how values become the basis for commonsense constructions of the world, see Quinn and Holland, "Culture and Cognition," 11. back to text

5. See Bellah et al., Habits of the Heart; Dumont, Essays on Individualism; Hewitt, Dilemmas of the American Self; Wilkinson, Pursuit of American Character. back to text

6. See Becker, Disrupted Lives. back to text

7. Efforts to ensure continuity, in cases of infertility, are made through use of reproductive technologies. See Becker, ibid. back to text

8. In Disrupted Lives I outline the contemporary Western conception of the course of life as predictable, knowable, and continuous. back to text

9. The postmodern turn challenges notions that the world is an ordered place. See, for example, Derrida, Of Grammatology. Nevertheless, people view their worlds as ordered. According to Hallowell (Culture and Experience, 94-95), order lies at the foundations of structures of meaning in human life, and it permeates social life. Geertz (Interpretation of Cultures, 90) observes that identities are secured when individual lives are anchored to some kind of larger, cosmic order. See also Lyon, "Order and Healing," 260, and Becker, Disrupted Lives. back to text

10. Yanagisako and Delaney, "Naturalizing Power," 2. back to text

11. See Wilkinson, Pursuit of American Character, 19, 50; Bellah et al., Habits of the Heart, 56, 206. back to text

12. Self-determination is an important aspect of individualism in the United States. See Bellah et al., Habits of the Heart. back to text

13. See Sandelowski, "Compelled to Try." back to text

14. Collier and Yanagisako, "Introduction," 7. To understand women's and men's responses to infertility and their actions, we must tease apart the folk model of reproduction. Yanagisako and Collier ("Toward a Unified Analysis," 40-42), suggest that the first step is to examine cultural meanings that play into the symbolic construction of categories of people. back to text

15. See Franklin, Embodied Progress; Edwards et al., Technologies of Procreation; Schneider, American Kinship; Strathern, After Nature and Reproducing the Future; Weiner, "Reproductive Model" and "Trobriand Kinship." back to text

16. See Lewin, Lesbian Mothers; Ludtke, On Our Own; Thorne and Yalom, Rethinking the Family; Tyler May, Barren in the Promised Land; Weston, Families We Choose. back to text

17. See Collier and Yanagisako, "Introduction," for discussion of culturally imposed differences. Biological sex becomes socially significant through the constitution of gender in social institutions and through social organization (Butler, Bodies That Matter; Grosz, Volatile Bodies). Identities, cultural meanings, and social relationships all emanate from the structural aspects of gender (Brenner and Laslett, "Social Reproduction"). See Edwards et al., Technologies of Procreation, and Strathern, After Nature and Reproducing the Future, for discussions of how kinship is viewed as natural.

18. See Franklin, Embodied Progress, 58; Weiner, "Reproductive Model," "Trobriand Kinship," and "Reassessing Reproduction." See also Franklin, Embodied Progress, 57-65, for a synopsis of Weiner's work. back to text

19. Strathern ("Regulation, Substitution," 172-73) observes that Euro-American ideas about kinship rest on multiple orderings of knowledge and that people move between orders of knowledge. Examples abound of the cultural importance of biology in American life, the most striking of which have been the eugenics movements. See Duster, Backdoor to Eugenics; Nelkin and Lindee,DNA Mystique; and May, Barren in the Promised Land. back to text

20. Martin, "Egg and the Sperm." back to text

21. Nelkin and Lindee, DNA Mystique. See also Duster, Backdoor to Eugenics. back to text

22. See Davis, "Surrogates and Outcast Mothers" and Women, Race, and Class; May, Barren in the Promised Land. back to text

23. Nelkin and Lindee, DNA Mystique, 2. Haraway (Modest_Witness) refers to the current preoccupation with genetics as "gene fetishism." back to text

24. Nelkin and Lindee, DNA Mystique, 58. back to text

25. Victor Turner, who developed notions of liminality and being "in between" in his work on ritual, observed in Ritual Process that liminal people are suspended in social space. See Becker, Disrupted Lives, 119-35, for discussion of living in limbo. Angela Davis ("Surrogates and Outcast Mothers") addresses how adulthood and womanhood are equated with motherhood. back to text

26. Victor Turner (Ritual Process) refers to the conclusion of the ritual process as "communitas" to signify the communal nature of ritual. back to text

27. Using a donor egg alleviates age-related worries about Down's syndrome because egg donors are invariably young (in their early twenties to early thirties). back to text

Table of Contents

Acknowledgments
Introduction: From Personal Experience to Research
1. Consuming Technologies
2. Confronting Notions of Normalcy
3. The Embattled Body
4. Genes and Generations
5. Experiencing Risks
6. Taking Action
7. Selling Hope
8. Decisions about Donors
9. Embodied Technology
10. Shifting Gears
11. Redefining Normalcy
12. Women Rethinking Parenthood
13. Rewriting the Family
14. Performing Gender

Editorial Reviews

Infertility is no longer a neutral term suggesting an inability to conceive, according to Becker (Disrupted Lives; Healing the Infertile Family), but has become a "disease" to be cured through a strange marriage of medicine, technology and commerce. In this study of the "subjective experience" of using reproductive technologies, based on interviews with more than 300 women and men, she argues that a variety of market and ethical forces conspire to make these treatments look not only deceptively safe and successful, but also morally necessary. Chancy technologies such as in vitro fertilization (success rate: 20%) tap into what Becker identifies as a specifically American tolerance for gambling and risk; at the same time, she suggests, they invoke a more conventional Protestant ethic of perseverance and meritocracy. Becker's interview subjects believe they'll either get lucky or work hard enough to become pregnant, but the time-consuming, expensive and exhausting process leaves the women feeling like machines, dehumanized and violated, while the men feel emasculated and left out. The long quotations from the study's participants are far less compelling than Becker's intriguing argument that anxieties around reproductive technologies encapsulate cultural assumptions about what sorts of people (white, monied, educated) are encouraged to reproduce. Becker's work will interest the increasing number of people considering reproductive technologies, as well as health professionals, cultural anthropologists and general readers concerned with the developing relationship between technology and the body. (Dec.) Copyright 2000 Cahners Business Information.

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