The Unborn Human
edited by Deborah Lupton
Introduction: Conceptualising and Configuring the Unborn Human
Unborn human organisms – embryos and foetuses – experience an unprecedented level of discursive prominence in the contemporary era. Debates about the moral status of the unborn, about their claims to personhood and whether they should be treated as full human subjects, have been ongoing for a long time, particularly in areas related to religious philosophy, bioethics and abortion politics. Over the past half-century, however, these debates have become more diversified, intense and complex in response to a number of social, technological and economic changes. More so than at any other time in human history, embryos and foetuses are represented in public forums as beautiful, precious, vulnerable creatures that require the utmost levels of protection. They are commonly positioned as already fully human, indeed as already infants, and hence as deserving of the rights and privileges accorded the infant. (more)
Debates Over Unborn Personhood
- P Kreeft
- Human personhood begins at conception
- R George and P Lee
- Embryonic human persons. Talking Point on morality and human embryo research
- J Barry
- Medico-Christian Embryology, or the Unborn Child (From the Earliest Period of its Existence)
Mourning and Remembering the Lost Unborn
- M Kelley and S Trinidad
- Silent loss and the clinical encounter: parents’ and physicians’ experiences of stillbirth – a qualitative analysis
- D Davidson
- Reflections on doing research grounded in my experience of perinatal loss: from auto/biography to autoethnography
- S Murphy and H Thomas
- Stillbirth and loss: family practices and display
- Memorial video for pregnancy loss
Struggles Over Dealing with the Unwanted Unborn
- A Moscrop
- ‘Miscarriage or abortion?’ Understanding the medical language of pregnancy loss in Britain; a historical perspective
- W Tong, W Low, Y Wong, S Choong and R Jegasothy
- Exploring pregnancy termination experiences and needs among Malaysian women: a qualitative study
- The World’s Abortion Laws 2013 website
- N Zamberlin, M Romero and S Ramos
- Latin American women’s experiences with medical abortion in settings where abortion is legally restricted
- S Barot
- Governmental coercion in reproductive decision making: see it both ways
- S Childs and E Evans
- The revived debate on abortion is not simply dog whistle politics, but a threat to women’s rights
- A Peck
- Personhood advocates continue war on women’s rights despite growing list of defeats
- Personhood USA website
- ‘The Miracle of Life’ (excerpt from an anti-abortion film)
- N Stotland
- Abortion: social context, psychodynamic implications
- D Murphy
- My foetus (review of documentary of this name)
Assessing the Quality of the Unborn
- S Wang
- The past, present, and future of embryo selection in in vitro fertilization
- A Theodosiou and M Johnson
- The politics of human embryo research and the motivation to achieve PGD
- Termination of Pregnancy for Fetal Abnormality in England, Scotland and Wales
- S Aksoy
- Antenatal screening and its possible meaning from the unborn baby's perspective
- F Place
- Amniocentesis and motherhood: how prenatal testing shapes our cultural understandings of pregnancy and disability
- Parliamentary Inquiry into Abortion on the Grounds of Disability
The Surplus Unborn Entity
- J Conde
- Embryo donation: the government adopts a cause
- P Andrews, H Moore and A Smith
- Human embryonic stem cells: prospects for human health – a 1 day international symposium held at the University of Sheffield
- H Greely
- Moving human embryonic stem cells from legislature to lab: remaining legal and ethical questions
- R Blackford
- Stem cell research on other worlds, or why embryos do not have a right to life
- T Douglas and J Savulescu
- Destroying unwanted embryos in research. Talking Point on morality and human embryo research
- B Manninen
- Revisiting the argument from fetal potential
- B Manninen
- Are human embryos Kantian persons? Kantian considerations in favor of embryonic stem cell research
- E Sills and S Murphy
- Determining the status of non-transferred embryos in Ireland: a conspectus of case law and implications for clinical IVF practice
- A Sagan and P Singer
- Embryos, stem cells and moral status: a response to George and Lee
- E Haimes and K Taylor
- The contributions of empirical evidence to socio-ethical debates on fresh embryo donation for human embryonic stem cell research
- S Takahashi, M Fujita, A Fujimoto, T Fujiwara, T Yano, O Tsutsumi, Y Taketani and A Akabayashi
- The decision-making process for the fate of frozen embryos by Japanese infertile women: a qualitative study
Unborn Entities as Moral Work Objects
- W Saletan
- The healer: how Shinya Yamanaka transformed the stem-cell war and made everyone a winner
- K Ehrich, C Williams and B Farsides
- The embryo as moral work object: PGD/IVF staff views and experiences
- K Ehrich, C Williams and B Farsides
- Fresh or frozen? Classifying ‘spare’ embryos for donation to human embryonic stem cell research
- K Ehrich, C Williams, B Farsides, J Sandall and R Scott
- Choosing embryos: ethical complexity and relational autonomy in staff accounts of PGD
- K Ehrich, C Williams, B Farsides and R Scott
- Embryo futures and stem cell research: the management of informed uncertainty
Visualising the Unborn
- H Barniville
- The morphology and histology of a human embryo of 8.5 mm
- ‘Making Visible Embryos’ website
- ‘Lennart Nilsson Photography’ website
- ‘The Visual MD’ (Alexander Tsiaras’s company) website
- ‘The Visible Embryo’ website
- ‘The Multi Dimensional Human Embryo’ website
- ‘In the Womb’ (excerpt from a National Geographic documentary)
- ‘The Miracle of Life Part 1’ (excerpt from Lennart Nilsson's documentary)
- Alexander Tsiaras's TED talk about his visualisations of the unborn
- ‘The Sociology of the Unborn’ Pinterest board
- E Tansey and D Christie (eds)
- Looking At the Unborn: Historical Aspects of Obstetric Ultrasound
- N Reissland, B Francis, J Mason and K Lincoln
- Do facial expressions develop before birth?
- ‘The Ultrasound as Cultural Artefact’ Pinterest board
Risk and Maternal Responsibility
- T A Helme
- An address on the unborn child: its care and rights
- B Rhetta
- A plea for the lives of the unborn
- I Monie
- Influence of the environment on the unborn
- J Machado, P Filho, G Petersen and J Chatkin
- Quantitative effects of tobacco smoking exposure on the maternal-fetal circulation
- C Spong
- Protection against prenatal alcohol-induced damage
- S Yazdani, Y Yosofniyapasha, B Nasab, M Mojaveri and Z Bouzari
- Effect of maternal body mass index on pregnancy outcome and newborn weight
- E Saastad, B Winje, B Pedersen, B. Stray and Froen, J. Frederick
- Fetal movement counting improved identification of fetal growth restriction and perinatal outcomes – a multi-centre, randomized, control trial
- P Lowe, E Lee and L Yardley
- Under the influence? The construction of foetal alcohol syndrome in UK newspapers
- K McDonald, L Amir and M-A Davey
- Maternal bodies and medicines: a commentary on risk and decision-making of pregnant and breastfeeding women and health professionals
- A Maas, C Vreeswijk, E de Cock, C Rijk and H van Bakel
- 'Expectant parents': study protocol of a longitudinal study concerning prenatal (risk) factors and postnatal infant development, parenting, and parent-infant relationships
- E Beveridge, H Anath and H Scurlock
- What protection for the unborn child of a psychologically vulnerable adult?
- J Dayan, C Creveuil, M Dreyfus, M Herlicoviez, J-M Baleyte and V O’Keane
- Developmental model of depression applied to prenatal depression: role of past and present life events, post emotional disorders and pregnancy stress
- S Ratnapalan, Y Bentur and G Koren
- Doctor, will that x-ray harm my unborn child?
- H Bayrampour, M Heaman, K Duncan and S Tough
- Advanced maternal age and risk perception: a qualitative study
- R Westfall and C Benoit
- Interpreting compliance and resistance to medical dominance in women’s accounts of their pregnancies
- S Viaux-Savalon, M Dommergues, O Rosenblum, M Bodeau, E Aidane, O Philippon, P Mazet, C Vibert-Guigue, D Vauthier-Brouzes, R Feldman and D Cohen
- Prenatal ultrasound screening: false positive soft markers may alter maternal representations and mother-infant interaction
Bringing the Maternal Body Back In
- J Souza, A Oliveira-Neto, F Surita, J Cecatti, E Amaral and J Pinto e Silva
- The prolongation of somatic support in a pregnant woman with brain-death: a case report
- D Riggs and C Due
- Gay men, race and surrogacy in India
- A Bosanquet
- An image carnal and divine: angels playing with placenta