The Surrogate Mother: Sed mater certissima?

Abstract

This chapter tells the story of the new reproductive technologies of the 1980s, which, for the first time in human history, allowed for extracorporeal fertilization—the implantation of fertilized ova into so-called gestational mothers—and significant advances in gamete cryopreservation. These new medical technologies were introduced alongside an “infertility scare,” which warned, falsely, that there was a widespread decrease in the male population’s sperm count and that single women faced increasingly dire prospects for romance. With pressure on women to be successful both in their careers and as nurturing mothers, the new reproductive technologies promised a way to save these women through surrogacy. Thus, the 1980s saw a revival of what was in fact a biblical-era technology: surrogate parenting. Margaret Atwood’s science fiction novel The Handmaid’s Tale (1986) is one work that made the connection between science and tradition clear; and while the supposedly new parental relationships were in truth nothing different from what had been imagined millennia ago, the science fiction trappings of in vitro fertilization (IVF) and the legal issues raised in paternity cases were. Here, the strange figure of the “surrogate mother” was born and debated upon either as a progressive validation of a woman’s right over her body or as a disgusting example of contracted slavery.