Reproduction and gender at the crossroads

Human reproduction has become a field of study that not only cuts across but also reconnects themes that for a long time science has been taking apart: biological/technical, natural/artificial, natural/cultural, human/non-human, public/private.
The combination of technological, cultural and political developments have placed family politics and reproductive issues center stage in national politics – and made grounds for biopolitics. Biopolitical issues of reproduction comprises questions of gender, ethnicity, social class, sexuality  - and how these social categories should be understood and related to political aims of equal rights. International migration, same sex parenthood and an eventual " new generation of fathers" raises new questions when it comes to family politics and welfare arrangements, and challenge mainstream conceptions about gender orders, mother- and fatherhood, family planning, family formations and kinship. Furthermore different forms of gamete donation and surrogacy are issues of great contemporary concern - for individual lives, for policy makers and for research.
The main aim of the seminar is to raise pressing debates, and to create a meeting place where scholars from different disciplines, policy makers and practitioners mutually can explore each other's knowledge, inspire each other, and discuss current controversies and future challenges in the multidisciplinary field of gender, ethnicity and reproduction.

This is a Norwegian/Nordic event, where international renowned key notes are invited for inspiration. Due to our special invited international guests the seminar will be held in English. Still, if any of you prefer to present your work in Norwegian, a parallel Norwegian panel will be set up.

Suggested topics: Assisted Reproduction, Surrogacy, Migration/Ethnicity, Pregnancy, Parenthood, In/Fertility, Family Planning, Religion, Bioethics, Biopolitics.

Key note speakers

Marcia Inhorn Department of Anthropology, University of Yale, USA

Charis Thompson Department of Women's Studies, University of Berkeley, USA

Sarah Franklin Department of Sociology, University of Cambridge, UK

Merete Lie Department of Interdisciplinary Studies of Culture, NTNU, Norway

Program

Thursday Nov 29
09.00-10.00	Registration
10.00-10.15	Opening and Welcome
10.15-11.15	Sarah Franklin, University of Cambridge: "Retooling Life: looking through embryos at the history of IVF"
11.15-12.15	Merete Lie, NTNU: "Reproduction Inside/Outside. Domestication of Reproductive Technologies"
12.15-13.15	Lunch
13.15-13.45	Arne Sunde, Trondheim University Hospital/NTNU:"Assisted reproduction, what's next  - and why?"
13.45-14.15	Marit Melhuus, University of Oslo: "Biotechnology and law// fact and values. Or: how the state acts on what it "knows".
14.15-14.30	Coffee break
14.30-16.00	Guro Korsnes Kristensen, NTNU: "Family planning in multi-cultural Norway" Manuela Perrotta, NTNU: "Creating Life in the Lab: Embryos as Biocultural Objects" Malin Noem Ravn, NTNU: "New fathers and bodily differences" Kristin Spilker, NTNU: "Gender and reproduction: Ontological shiftings of cells and bodies"
18.30	Film Screening: "The Good, The True and The Beautiful - A film about scientific imaging." (NCR / NTNU)
19.00	Reception Association for Gender Research in Norway (FORK)
19.30	Conference dinner
Friday Nov 30
09.00-10.00	Charis Thompson, University of Berkeley: Unlikely Dish Fellows: The Biotech Mode of Reproduction and the Question of Too Much Heterosex Revisited
10.00-11.00	Marcia Inhorn, University of Yale: "Global Gametes: Reproductive "Tourism" and Islamic Bioethics in the High-tech Middle East"
11.00-11.15	Coffee break
11.15-11.45	Trude Lappegård, Statistics Norway: "Gender and Multipartner Fertility"
11.45-12.15	An-Magritt Jensen, NTNU: "Gendered spaces of reproduction?"
12.15-13.15	Lunch
13.15-14.45	Parallel sessions (program below)
14.45-15.00	Coffee Break
15.00-15.30	Jørgen Lorentzen, University of Oslo: "Reproducing Fatherhood"
15.30-16.00	Berge Solberg, NTNU: Getting beyond the welfare of the child in assisted reproduction
16.00-16.15	Sum Up & End

Parallel Sessions (Nov 30)

Unn Conradi Andersen We are family. Negotiation of kinship in post-divorce families	Charlotte Kroløkke & Stine Willum Adrian Life after Death. Sperm, Property, and Hope
Marie Antonsen Here are the mising masses? Emotions as the lay peoples ethical expertise: A case study of the controversy of early ultrasound in Norway	Lise Kanckos Family Values or Equality between Women. The Finnish Parliamentary Debate on Assisted Reproduction
Anette Hoel Continuity, change and complexity. Ethnic Minority Fathers at the Cultural Crossroad	Ingvill Stuvøy Bodywork and the Global Market in the 21st Century: How Surrogacy Broadens Consumer Choice and Responsibility
Elzbieta Korolczuk Infertility as Identity. Biosocial grouping as a site of identity formation	Mala Naveen Globabies: a story about how new technology made Mother India leap into the world of surrogacy

 

Organisers

The conference is organized and hosted by three collaborating partners:

• Department of Interdisciplinary Studies of Culture, Norwegian University of Science and Technology, NTNU
• "Reproductive relations -Production of gendered meanings in the field of reproduction". Research project funded by The Programme for Gender Research, Norwegian Research Council. 
•  Association for Women's Studies and Gender Research in Norway (FORK)

Organising commitee

Guro Korsnes Kristensen, Manuela Perrotta, Malin Noem Ravn and Kristin Spilker