TY - JOUR
T1 - The golden cage of sperm banking industry
AU - Bokek-Cohen, Ya'arit
N1 - Publisher Copyright:
© 2015 Elsevier Ltd.
PY - 2015/11/1
Y1 - 2015/11/1
N2 - The present article aims at exploring whether, if at all, women can achieve any degree of procreative liberty by shopping for sperm donations in commercial sperm banks, which is an understudied arena for evaluating maternal agency and freedom of mind. In order to address this topic, a content analysis of 180 donor profiles from six American sperm banks was conducted. Data analysis provided vital evidence of symbolic violence and reproduction of male symbolic capital by manipulating those women who dared to challenge the heterosexist social order. Rather than exercising free choice, customers of sperm donations, mostly unmarried women, shop for masculinized sperm, and in doing so they are forced to make a patriarchal bargain. Masculinized catalogues contribute to delegitimizing non-traditional gender images and family structures. Recipients of donations are not the only victims of symbolic violence; their yet-to-be-born children are also subject to the same manipulation. Since these children strive to read their biological fathers' characteristics, the donor profile functions as a socializing medium which enables men to deliver a cultural legacy to the next generation.
AB - The present article aims at exploring whether, if at all, women can achieve any degree of procreative liberty by shopping for sperm donations in commercial sperm banks, which is an understudied arena for evaluating maternal agency and freedom of mind. In order to address this topic, a content analysis of 180 donor profiles from six American sperm banks was conducted. Data analysis provided vital evidence of symbolic violence and reproduction of male symbolic capital by manipulating those women who dared to challenge the heterosexist social order. Rather than exercising free choice, customers of sperm donations, mostly unmarried women, shop for masculinized sperm, and in doing so they are forced to make a patriarchal bargain. Masculinized catalogues contribute to delegitimizing non-traditional gender images and family structures. Recipients of donations are not the only victims of symbolic violence; their yet-to-be-born children are also subject to the same manipulation. Since these children strive to read their biological fathers' characteristics, the donor profile functions as a socializing medium which enables men to deliver a cultural legacy to the next generation.
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=84949314154&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1016/j.wsif.2015.01.004
DO - 10.1016/j.wsif.2015.01.004
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AN - SCOPUS:84949314154
SN - 0277-5395
VL - 53
SP - 107
EP - 118
JO - Women's Studies International Forum
JF - Women's Studies International Forum
ER -
