This is a closed event. Registration/participation is not possible.
Program [PDF]
Interview with Annika König at the TRAFO Blog
Book presentation: Anindita Majumdar “Transnational Commercial Surrogacy and the (Un)Making of Kin in India”
The proposed workshop will gather a group of international scholars to focus on gestational surrogacy as a transnational practice and the global movements, networks, and circulations within which it takes place. Although surrogacy is a very specific reproductive technology, it can serve as a looking glass for a better understanding of broader societal, cultural, economic, and political issues involved in 21st century reproduction. Through the investigation of surrogacy, we are able to learn more about global flows of biocapital, about political agendas concerning family and kinship, and about ethical problems that emerge as a result of the continuing further development of the biosciences and biotechnology. Studying surrogacy also enables an examination of the interdependency of gender, work, and global inequality, as they become, for example, observable in the form of ‘stratified reproduction’ – the encouragement of certain people to reproduce (e.g. academics), while discouraging others (e.g. unemployed or people of certain ethnic backgrounds). Therefore, studying gestational surrogacy not only helps us to better understand this particular form of medically assisted reproduction, but also encourages more general and highly relevant observations of transnational problems today regarding the transfer of ideas, technologies, medical knowledge, people, and biocapital across nations and regions.
