Imaging/imagining Reproductive Crisis

9 Dec 2024

In this workshop Dr Rebecca Close explored the entanglements between images and imaginations of the so-called fertility crisis as constitutive of the epistemic, affective and political investments that determine how societies manage reproductive capacities and practices.

Rather than only studying images as sources to analyse the visual cultures of fertility or examining how effective singular images are in imagining solutions to the crisis they presuppose, this workshop explored a reproductive politics approach that addresses images and image-making as participating in a field of struggle in which knowledge, ideas and feelings about reproduction, sexuality, sex-gender, race and ability are negotiated.

Two texts by Rebecca Close were discussed: the recent paper   Full article: The Fertility Fix: the Boom in Facial-matching Algorithms for Donor Selection in Assisted Reproduction in Spain and a shorter work-in-progress, titled A time-lapse history of the oocyte cell. How might critical readings of contemporary and historical imaging practices at the intersection of commercial fertility worlds and reproductive biology lab research offer other understanding of reproductive crisis and its solutions?  

Presenter: Dr Rebecca Close, DOROTHY Post-doctoral Fellow, School of Applied Social Studies and ISS21

Discussants: Róisín O’Gorman (Theatre), Rosie Meade (Applied Social Studies), Oana Sânziana Marian (Pregnancy Loss Research Group), Brendan Fitzgerald (Pregnancy Loss Research Group) and Kylie Thomas (History of Art). Moderator: Órla O’Donovan

Chair: Dr Orla O'Donovan (photo below)

Find out more about this research at: Imaging/Imagining Reproductive Crisis: Time-lapse microscopy, animation and fertility discourse | University College Cork

For more on this story contact:

Dr Rebecca Close (close.rebecca@gmail.com)