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Introduction

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Knowledge as Resistance

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Abstract

In this chapter, I introduce the Feminist International Network of Resistance to Reproductive and Genetic Engineering (FINRRAGE), a mixture of Anglo-European feminists and anti-population policy activists from the global South. I explain my approach to the research and my exploration of FINRRAGE as a cognitive praxis, creating and disseminating knowledge about new reproductive technologies.

Tell them stories of action and reflection, these things belong together.

Maria Mies, Germany

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Notes

  1. 1.

    It is currently possible for children to have both a biological and social father, and genetic, mitochondrial, gestational and social mothers, all of whom may be different individuals. Mitochondria are organelles within the cell which generate energy and carry their own mtDNA, inherited only through the female line. Where mitochondrial illness may be a risk, nuclear DNA from the mother’s egg can be transferred into a donated egg before fertilisation so that the child is still genetically related, and if female, will now pass the donor’s mtDNA on to her descendants. Technically germline engineering, the procedure was approved by the UK’s Human Fertilisation and Embryo Authority in 2015 (HFEA 2016).

  2. 2.

    After 11 failed experiments worldwide, a 35-year-old Swedish woman recently gave birth to the first child conceived after transplantation of the uterus of a postmenopausal donor (Brännström et al. 2014).

  3. 3.

    There are now services which create anonymised embryos in bulk for direct sales to prospective parents; in this scenario, ownership of the embryo rests with the clinic until purchased (Zarembo 2012). A subsequent article in the New England Journal of Medicine reasoned that this was both legal and ethical as sale of gametes is not prohibited in the United States (Cohen and Adashi 2013).

  4. 4.

    A process called CRISPR-Cas9, which occurs naturally in bacteria, is now being used to cut DNA, making precision genome editing possible (Doudna and Charpentier 2014). In a recent hearing on the ethics of human germline engineering held by the US National Academies of Science, it was decided that using this technique on human embryos could be acceptable for some severe illnesses (NASM 2017).

  5. 5.

    Although this term has fallen out of use, I have chosen to retain it here as it was the way the technologies were referred to at the time. It also functions to connect new technologies for contraception to those for assisted conception, which as will be shown, was a key issue for FINRRAGE.

  6. 6.

    ‘Issues in’ was added to the original title in the third year at Pergamon’s request, to clarify that it was not a scientific journal.

  7. 7.

    Available at http://finrrage.org. Where documents can also be accessed there, I have referenced them as electronic resources instead of as part of an archival collection.

  8. 8.

    ‘Liberation or Loss? Women act on the new reproductive technologies’, Australian National University, Canberra, May 1986. Collected conference papers, unbound. Archived at Jessie Street National Women’s Library, Sydney: JSNWL Q174.25 NAT.

  9. 9.

    This would describe one member of my cohort, Rebecca Albury, a feminist working closely with the issues who attended some events and was on the mailing list for a number of years, but did not think of herself as a ‘member’ of FINRRAGE.

  10. 10.

    I draw here on Calver et al. (2005) who propose the idea of a ‘forest conscienceness’ which links awareness of the forest’s intrinsic value with the imperative to take care when it is used for economic purposes.

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  1. Institute for the Study of the Human, University of Sheffield, Sheffield, UK

    Stevienna de Saille

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de Saille, S. (2017). Introduction. In: Knowledge as Resistance. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1057/978-1-137-52727-1_1

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1057/978-1-137-52727-1_1

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