• Login
    • Submit
    View Item 
    •   Repository Home
    • UT Electronic Theses and Dissertations
    • UT Electronic Theses and Dissertations
    • View Item
    • Repository Home
    • UT Electronic Theses and Dissertations
    • UT Electronic Theses and Dissertations
    • View Item
    JavaScript is disabled for your browser. Some features of this site may not work without it.

    Going Into labor: (un)making mothers in India's transnational surrogacy markets

    Icon
    View/Open
    KOHLI-THESIS-2013.pdf (660.0Kb)
    Date
    2013-05
    Author
    Kohli, Namita
    Share
     Facebook
     Twitter
     LinkedIn
    Metadata
    Show full item record
    Abstract
    In this study, I am concerned with the practices of representation and labor control that enable the extraction of value from the bodies of working class women in India’s transnational surrogacy markets. Recent ethnographic studies on transnational surrogacy in India have conceptualized surrogacy as a form of waged labor and focused on critically examining the structure of surrogacy markets and the production of mother-workers. This study builds on these ethnographic approaches towards surrogacy as labor, and analyzes the discourses and the practices of labor control that enable service providers to extract value from the women’s bodies; a large part of this value accrues from their treatment as disposable. I begin by analyzing the discourses around surrogate mothers in three key sites of representation, that is, the news media, service provider websites and the draft legislation that is set to regulate the use of assisted reproductive technologies in India. Subsequently, I critically examine my interactions with service providers in New Delhi to unearth the mechanisms of disciplining and surveillance that are used to control, discipline and ensure productivity of the surrogate labor. My findings suggest that surrogate mothers are always framed within the competing discourses of “exploitation” and “empowerment” in the press, while the service providers represent them within the frames of “opportunity”. In the draft legislation, the rights of surrogate mothers are based on the market-based assumptions about reproductive autonomy and the disposability of working class women’s bodies. A critical examination of my interactions with service providers, and their recruitment and disciplining strategies, reveals the ways by which labor is effectively disciplined and controlled for value extraction. Thus, this study highlights some of the ways by which working class women’s labor is exploited and their bodies are treated as disposable. Future studies should attend to the ways in which the surrogate mothers experience these practices that they are subject to and whether, or not, disrupt the production of the “ideal” mother-worker.
    Department
    Women's and Gender Studies
    Subject
    Surrogate mothers
    Labor
    Transnational surrogacy
    Surrogate mothers India
    URI
    http://hdl.handle.net/2152/41475
    Collections
    • UT Electronic Theses and Dissertations
    University of Texas at Austin Libraries
    • facebook
    • twitter
    • instagram
    • youtube
    • CONTACT US
    • MAPS & DIRECTIONS
    • JOB OPPORTUNITIES
    • UT Austin Home
    • Emergency Information
    • Site Policies
    • Web Accessibility Policy
    • Web Privacy Policy
    • Adobe Reader
    Subscribe to our NewsletterGive to the Libraries

    © The University of Texas at Austin

    Browse

    Entire RepositoryCommunities & CollectionsDate IssuedAuthorsTitlesSubjectsDepartmentThis CollectionDate IssuedAuthorsTitlesSubjectsDepartment

    My Account

    Login

    Information

    AboutContactPoliciesGetting StartedGlossaryHelpFAQs

    Statistics

    View Usage Statistics
    University of Texas at Austin Libraries
    • facebook
    • twitter
    • instagram
    • youtube
    • CONTACT US
    • MAPS & DIRECTIONS
    • JOB OPPORTUNITIES
    • UT Austin Home
    • Emergency Information
    • Site Policies
    • Web Accessibility Policy
    • Web Privacy Policy
    • Adobe Reader
    Subscribe to our NewsletterGive to the Libraries

    © The University of Texas at Austin