Tracing pathways of relatedness: how identity-release gamete donors negotiate biological (non-)parenthood

This article draws on an interview study with UK 'identity-release' sperm and egg donors, exploring how, in the context of a new ethic of openness around donor conception, they articulate their role in relation to offspring. I show that participants neither dismissed, nor straightforwardly...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Families, relationships and societies relationships and societies, 2020-07, Vol.9 (2), p.235-251
Main Author: Gilman, Leah
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Children
Egg Donor
Family Practices
Gamete Donation
Identity
Kinship
Parenthood
Parents & parenting
Relationality
Sperm Donor
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Summary:This article draws on an interview study with UK 'identity-release' sperm and egg donors, exploring how, in the context of a new ethic of openness around donor conception, they articulate their role in relation to offspring. I show that participants neither dismissed, nor straightforwardly activated, the relational significance of the 'biological' substance they donated. Instead, they renegotiated its meaning in ways which do not map straightforwardly on to established kinship roles. Building on a conception of personal lives and selves as fundamentally relational (Mason, 2004; Smart, 2007; May, 2013), I show how donors managed the conflicting demands of identity-release donation by tracing their relatedness to offspring along particular pathways (while diminishing others); the inherent connectedness of their own lives and selves enabled them to construct indirect non-parental connections with offspring as the siblings of their own children or the children of their friends or sisters.
ISSN:2046-7435
2046-7443
DOI:10.1332/204674319X15536817073756