- Canada
Aryn Martin
York University, Science and Technology Studies, Faculty Member
- Social Studies Of Science, Medical Anthropology, Queer Theory, Sex and Gender, History of Science and Technology, Annemarie Mol, and 17 moreSocial and Cultural Anthropology, Anthropology of the Body, Anthropology, Ethnography, Gender and Sexuality, Feminist Theory, Chimerism, History of Science, Elizabeth Grosz, Microchimerism, Feminist science and technology studies, Bodies and Culture, Science and Technology Studies, Computer Networks, Databases, Software, and Performativityedit
We report on a patient with monosomy 18 mosaicism, a previously undescribed chromosome abnormality. The phenotype is reminiscent of chromosome 18 ring mosaicism. The reason that the patient survived may be attributed to low level... more
We report on a patient with monosomy 18 mosaicism, a previously undescribed chromosome abnormality. The phenotype is reminiscent of chromosome 18 ring mosaicism. The reason that the patient survived may be attributed to low level mosaicism for the monosomy.
Research Interests:
Research Interests:
Care is a slippery word. Any attempt to define it will be exceeded by its multivocality in everyday and scholarly use. In its enactment, care is both necessary to the fabric of biological and social existence and notorious for the... more
Care is a slippery word. Any attempt to define it will be exceeded by its multivocality in everyday and scholarly use. In its enactment, care is both necessary to the fabric of biological and social existence and notorious for the problems that it raises when it is defined, legislated, measured, and evaluated. What care looks and feels like is both context-specific and perspective-dependent. Yet, this elusiveness does not mean that it lacks importance. In our engagements with the worlds that we study, construct, and inhabit, we cannot but care: care is an essential part of being a researcher and a citizen. To properly invite you into this Special Issue, then, we need to say something about what we mean when we write about care.
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Authors: Aryn Martin and Kelly Holloway This article appraises the late twentieth century maxim that prior to thalidomide’s clarion call in 1961, a generic ‘‘we’’ believed that the fetus was protected from external insult by the... more
Authors: Aryn Martin and Kelly Holloway
This article appraises the late twentieth century maxim that prior to thalidomide’s clarion call in 1961, a
generic ‘‘we’’ believed that the fetus was protected from external insult by the placental barrier. Complicating
this truism, we demonstrate that the placenta was, since early in the twentieth century, conceived
of as a site of constant passage of entities both necessary to, and dangerous for, fetal development. Moving
between evidence from specialist journals, obstetrics textbooks, and pregnancy advice manuals, we
argue that the placental barrier writ large only emerged as an explicit actor after the medical community
was disillusioned with it: it became something that does not exist. The article proposes that the nostalgia
for a barrier lost constructs the modern-day fetus as more exposed and vulnerable than if ‘‘we’’ had never
imagined this protection in the first place. The rhetorical shorthand of the erstwhile placental barrier has
both deflected more nuanced accounts of the thalidomide story and contributed to the increasing surveillance
of pregnant women’s behavior, particularly in late twentieth century North America.
This article appraises the late twentieth century maxim that prior to thalidomide’s clarion call in 1961, a
generic ‘‘we’’ believed that the fetus was protected from external insult by the placental barrier. Complicating
this truism, we demonstrate that the placenta was, since early in the twentieth century, conceived
of as a site of constant passage of entities both necessary to, and dangerous for, fetal development. Moving
between evidence from specialist journals, obstetrics textbooks, and pregnancy advice manuals, we
argue that the placental barrier writ large only emerged as an explicit actor after the medical community
was disillusioned with it: it became something that does not exist. The article proposes that the nostalgia
for a barrier lost constructs the modern-day fetus as more exposed and vulnerable than if ‘‘we’’ had never
imagined this protection in the first place. The rhetorical shorthand of the erstwhile placental barrier has
both deflected more nuanced accounts of the thalidomide story and contributed to the increasing surveillance
of pregnant women’s behavior, particularly in late twentieth century North America.
This article appraises the late twentieth century maxim that prior to thalidomide’s clarion call in 1961, a generic ‘‘we’’ believed that the fetus was protected from external insult by the placental barrier. Complicating this truism, we... more
This article appraises the late twentieth century maxim that prior to thalidomide’s clarion call in 1961, a
generic ‘‘we’’ believed that the fetus was protected from external insult by the placental barrier. Complicating
this truism, we demonstrate that the placenta was, since early in the twentieth century, conceived
of as a site of constant passage of entities both necessary to, and dangerous for, fetal development. Moving
between evidence from specialist journals, obstetrics textbooks, and pregnancy advice manuals, we
argue that the placental barrier writ large only emerged as an explicit actor after the medical community
was disillusioned with it: it became something that does not exist. The article proposes that the nostalgia
for a barrier lost constructs the modern-day fetus as more exposed and vulnerable than if ‘‘we’’ had never
imagined this protection in the first place. The rhetorical shorthand of the erstwhile placental barrier has
both deflected more nuanced accounts of the thalidomide story and contributed to the increasing surveillance
of pregnant women’s behavior, particularly in late twentieth century North America.
generic ‘‘we’’ believed that the fetus was protected from external insult by the placental barrier. Complicating
this truism, we demonstrate that the placenta was, since early in the twentieth century, conceived
of as a site of constant passage of entities both necessary to, and dangerous for, fetal development. Moving
between evidence from specialist journals, obstetrics textbooks, and pregnancy advice manuals, we
argue that the placental barrier writ large only emerged as an explicit actor after the medical community
was disillusioned with it: it became something that does not exist. The article proposes that the nostalgia
for a barrier lost constructs the modern-day fetus as more exposed and vulnerable than if ‘‘we’’ had never
imagined this protection in the first place. The rhetorical shorthand of the erstwhile placental barrier has
both deflected more nuanced accounts of the thalidomide story and contributed to the increasing surveillance
of pregnant women’s behavior, particularly in late twentieth century North America.
Research Interests:
Many scientific and nonscientific activities involve practices of counting. Counting is, perhaps, the most elementary of numerical practices: an ability to count is presupposed in arithmetic and other branches of mathematics , and... more
Many scientific and nonscientific activities involve practices of counting. Counting is, perhaps, the most elementary of numerical practices: an ability to count is presupposed in arithmetic and other branches of mathematics , and counting also is part of innumerable everyday and specialized activities. Though it is a simple practice when considered abstractly, in specific cases counting can be quite complicated, contentious, and socially consequential. Categorical judgments determine what counts as an eligible case, instance, or datum, and these judgments can be difficult and controversial. By focusing on such difficulties, this article aims to elucidate practices that are crucial for the production and stabilization of natural and social orders. Cases discussed in the article are provisionally divided between counting (nonhuman) things and counting people. Cases of counting things include scientific practices of counting the number of human chromosomes and forensic procedures for counting matches in DNA profiles. Cases of counting people include estimates of crowd size and counts and recounts of election ballots. Counting people not only is a matter of including an object or person in a class or group, but also involves reciprocal performances in which the counted objects are complicit in, or resistive to, the social production of counts. Variable, and otherwise troubled and contested, instances of counting are used to elucidate the numero-politics of counting: how assigning numbers to things is embedded in disciplined fields, systems of registration and surveillance, technological checks and verifications, and fragile networks of trust.