Jeong, Yeonbo (Author)
This dissertation examines the debate surrounding the donation of women's reproductive tissues for stem cell research in South Korea. Women's reproductive tissues such as eggs, embryos, and umbilical cord blood have become important raw materials for stem cell research. As these tissues are processed, donated, stored in "biobanks," circulated, and used for research, the meanings of body, property, citizenship, and gender are contested and constituted. Moreover, discourse around the donation of reproductive tissues in South Korea is associated with the meanings of nationalism. Science and technology are considered important for South Korea to 'catch up with' or even 'lead' other Western countries in the global competition. Thus, reproductive tissue donation has been often encouraged as a way to contribute to national development by providing materials for scientific research as well as a way to help other fellow citizens. This nationalist discourse combined with scientific advancement shapes what it means to be a "good citizen" and a "good woman." How women define their bodies is not only affected by the media but also by various contexts of their experiences. Women themselves both reinforce and challenge the strong discourse. This dissertation illuminates the contestation and negotiations surrounding the donation of women's reproductive tissues at various levels of national and transnational contexts. When we look at the complex re-shaping of meanings, donation is not confined within a binary of gift and commodity, or coercion and voluntariness. Rather than seeing the Korean case as a "particular" or "exotic" phenomenon, this dissertation sees it as a symptom of the transnational flow of capital, ideas, materials, and bodies. I explore how the concepts of women's bodies, nation, and science are reframed in political, legal, economic, and historical aspects of South Korea in a transnational context. I also argue that it is necessary to explore how risks and benefits of biotechnologies are disproportionately distributed along the lines of gender, race, class, and geographical regions. While the central debate in stem cell research has focused mostly on the moral status of embryos as if gender were not an important factor in this research, this dissertation shows that women's health and rights should be considered an important issue in biomedical research by illuminating the particular relations and forces in Korea that have made women's reproductive tissues important raw materials for stem cell research. The tissues originally came from women's bodies, but only they take the risks of collection, and they have little right to the products. As one of the important actors in this flow, women's voices should be strongly considered. It is necessary to look at the larger social and cultural contexts of donation beyond liberalist framework of informed consent, and collective ways of intervening in the current circulation of reproductive tissues.
...MoreDescription Cited in Dissertation Abstracts International-A 75/11(E), May 2015. Proquest Document ID: 1564044241.
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