Assisted Reproductive Technologies and Culture Change

TLDR

Since the birth of the first IVF baby in 1978, assisted reproductive technologies have rapidly evolved, prompting shifting social, cultural, legal, and ethical responses and symbolizing the growing influence of biotechnologies on individual and collective identities worldwide. This review surveys the work of more than 50 anthropologists examining how ARTs influence kinship, marriage, family, gender, religion, and biomedicine. The authors conduct a literature review of anthropological studies to analyze ARTs' impacts across these domains. Their research reveals that ARTs simultaneously destabilize traditional social structures and generate new forms of kinship, identity, and cultural meaning.

Abstract

In 1978, the world's first “test-tube” baby was born via in vitro fertilization (IVF). The past 30 years have seen the rapid evolution of many other assisted reproductive technologies (ARTs)—some are simple variants of IVF, whereas others bridge the fields of assisted reproduction and human genomics. As ARTs have evolved over time, so have social, cultural, legal, and ethical responses to them. Indeed, ARTs are a key symbol of our times, representing the growing prominence of biotechnologies in the configuration of individual, familial, and collective identities around the globe. This review highlights the scholarship of more than 50 anthropologists who are studying the effects of ARTs in many areas of social life, including the traditional anthropological domains of kinship, marriage, and the family, gender, religion, and biomedicine. Their research bespeaks both the destabilizing and the generative impacts of ARTs at the interface between science and society.