‘Knowing’ the Surrogate Body in Israel

Abstract

Surrogate motherhod is an anomaly that that disrupts familiar conceptions of motherhood, kinship and family. How do surrogates and intended mothers accommodate and resist the anomalous connotations of this reproductive strategy’ How do they assess and negotiate their own positions in Israeli society through surrogacy‘ I will argue that throughout the surrogacy process, surrogates and intended mothers, together with doctors, nurses and ultrasound technicians, collectively generate alterations in received scripts about the maternal nature of pregnant bodies and the non-maternal makeup of infertile bodies. I shall engage the concept of ‘authoritative knowledge’ in order to shed light on these questions.

Keywords: authoritative knowledge, intuitive knowledge, embodied knowledge, surrogacy, gestational surrogacy, surrogate motherhood, surrogate mothers, intended parents, intended mothers, contractual surrogacy, motherhood