A Critical Age: Single Motherhood, Male Continuity, and the Making of Family and Nation in Israel

Productive Paradoxes of the Assisted Reproductive Technologies in the Context of the New Kinship Studies

“…The growing acceptance of nonmarital and gay and lesbian uses of the assisted reproductive technologies has engendered a wide landscape of practices that both confound—and sometimes paradoxically confirm—traditional notions of heterosexual and marital procreativity (Doberne, 2013; Hertz, 2006). In Israel, for instance, where IVF is widely available to both married and single women, Doberne (2013) has shown that it is the culturally salient genealogical continuity through men that renders some families—those with a father-husband present—fully acceptable to the project of national continuity, while other families—those created by single mothers without a father-husband present—are not.…”

“…36-37). In addition to IVF and sperm donation, surrogacy was made legal in 1996 and the moratorium on egg donation was lifted in 2010 (Doberne, 2013). There is, in addition, a bill pending that would legalize access to surrogacy for same-sex couples—in particular gay men—who had not heretofore had access to surrogacy arrangements within Israel (Doberne, personal communication).…”

El nacimiento hospitalario e intervencionista: un rito de paso hacia la maternidad

“…Implica, en definitiva, la aceptación de una realidad que parece ir más allá de dar a luz para situarse en la esfera biopolítica, en la órbita de una especie de eugenesia que garantice la reproducción social (Foucault, 1990) 11 , e incluso, en ocasiones, la construcción de la propia identidad nacional (Doberne, 2014). Se trata, pues, de una auténtica iniciación que en el caso de este texto se ha presentado en una estructura tripartita, desplegando un epígrafe por cada fase del ritual: separación, margen y agregación.…”