Redefining bioavailability through the 'lens' of migrant egg donors in Spain

Nahman, Michal; Weis, Christina

Abstract

This article utilises feminist technoscience studies’ notions of bodily ‘materialisation’ and ‘ontological choreographies’, offering a cyborg feminist account of ‘bioavailability’ as embodied becomings, rather than a fixed ontological state of being. Drawn from 2 years’ ethnographic study in in vitro fertilisation clinics in Spain with migrant women who provided eggs to the cross-border in vitro fertilisation industry, this work explores how global understandings of race and inequalities, clinical practices and women’s own emotional and physical labours collectively produce bioavailability. Through examples from observations and interviews in in vitro fertilisation clinics, we examined women’s embodied stories to understand the ways in which bioavailability becomes. The article demonstrates a novel way in which to think about ‘bioavailability’, a concept which has already been of enormous use to the social sciences since its introduction by Lawrence Cohen. We examine recent configurations of bodily extraction in the reproduction–migration nexus that help us rethink the concept of bioavailability.

• Journal Article Type: Article
• Acceptance Date: Dec 28, 2022
• Online Publication Date: Mar 18, 2023
• Publication Date: Mar 18, 2023
• Deposit Date: Jan 21, 2023
• Publicly Available Date: Mar 22, 2023
• Journal: Body and Society
• Print ISSN: 1357-034X
• Electronic ISSN: 1460-3632
• Publisher: SAGE Publications
• Peer Reviewed: Peer Reviewed
• Volume: 29
• Issue: 1
• Pages: 79-109
• DOI: https://doi.org/10.1177/1357034X231161319
• Keywords: Bioavailability, ontology, egg donation, migration, gender, embodiment, bioeconomy
• Public URL: https://uwe-repository.worktribe.com/output/10274620