Hostname: page-component-78c5997874-dh8gc Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-06T08:06:29.519Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

The Journey of Infertility from Private Sphere to Public Domain: From Cosmetic Surgery to Disability

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 January 2022

Soraya Tremayne
Soraya Tremayne*
Affiliation:
Institute of Social and Cultural Anthropology, University of Oxford
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

This study explores the process by which the treatment of infertility, which has been in the hands of the private sector, has been taken over by the state as a matter of public health. It argues that this shift stems from the pro-natalist policies of the state to help increase the population. Infertility treatment, using assisted reproductive technologies and its legitimization by the Islamic jurists, is used as a lens through which to examine the state's body politic. The frequent reversals of policies, since the late nineteenth century to the present, are shown to be directly linked with the nation-building goals of the state, expecting the citizens to readjust their reproductive behavior to meet the state’s policies.

Keywords

Population PoliciesInfertilityNation-buildingAssisted Reproductive TechnologiesIslamic Jurists
Type
Articles
Information
Iranian Studies , Volume 53 , Issue 1-2: Special Section: Medicine and Public Health in Modern Iran: Historical and Sociological Perspectives , March 2020 , pp. 113 - 127
Copyright
Copyright © Association For Iranian Studies, Inc 2020

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Abbasi-Shavazi, M.J., “La Fécondité en Iran: L’autre Revolution.” Population et Societé 373 (2001): 373.Google Scholar
Abbasi-Shavazi, M.J., McDonald, Peter, and Hosseini-Chavoshi, Meimanat. The Fertility Transition in Iran: Revolution and Reproduction. Dordrecht: Springer, 2009.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Akhondi, M.M., et al.Prevalence of Primary Infertility in Iran in 2010. Journal of Public Health 42, no. 12 (2013): 1398–1404.Google ScholarPubMed
Hoodfar, Homa, “Population Policy and Gender Equity in Post-Revolutionary Iran.” In Family, Gender and Population in the Middle East: Policies in Context, ed. Makhlouf, Carla, 80–105. Cairo: American University of Cairo Press, 1995.Google Scholar
Hoodfar, Homa, “Turning Back the Clock: Population Policy and Human Rights in Iran.” In Routledge Handbook on Human Rights and the Middle East and North Africa, ed. Chase, Anthony Tirado, 230–242. New York: Routledge, 2017.Google Scholar
Hoodfar, H., and Assadipour, S. “The Politics of Population Policy in the Islamic Republic of Iran.” Studies in Family Planning 31, no. 1(2000): 19–34. doi: 10.1111/j.1728-4465.2000.00019.xCrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Inhorn, Marcia C., and Van Ballen, Frank, eds. Infertility Around the Globe: New Thinking on Childlessness, Gender, and Reproductive Technologies. Berkeley: University of California Press, 2002.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Inhorn, Marcia C., and Tremayne, Soraya. Islam and Assisted Reproductive Technologies: Sunni and Shia Perspectives. New York: Berghahn Books, 2012.Google Scholar
Kashani-Sabet, Firoozeh, Conceiving Citizens: Women and the Politics of Motherhood in Iran. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2011.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Khamenei, A., Ajvebeh al-Esteftāʾāt Nashre Amir Kabir, 1999, Questions 1271 to 1277. Khomeini, R. Tahrir al-Wasilah. Qom: Islamic Publishing, 2001.Google Scholar
Ladier-Fouladi, Marie, “Population et Politique en Iran: De la Monarchie a la République islamique.” Les Cahiers de L’INED(Institut National des Etudes Demographiques) 150, no. 2 (2003).Google Scholar
Madani-Tabrizi, Y. al-Masāʾel al-Mostahdaseh, 3. Tehran: Ayatollah Madani-Tabrizi's Office, 2009: 212–228.Google Scholar
Najmabadi, Afsaneh, Professing Selves: Transsexuality and Same-Sex Desire in Contemporary Iran. Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 2013.Google Scholar
Parkin, David, “Foreword.” In Managing Reproductive Life: Cross-Cultural Themes in Fertility and Sexuality, ed. Tremayne, Soraya, iii–xii. New York: Berghahn Books, 2001.Google Scholar
Shadi-Talab, J., “Iranian Women: Rising Expectations.” Critique Critical Middle Eastern Studies 14, no. 1 (2005): 35–55. doi: 10.1080/10669920500057005Google Scholar
Tappan, Robert, “Ethical Decision-Making in Iranian Fertility Clinics.” In Islam and Assisted Reproductive Technologies: Sunni and Shia Perspectives, ed. Inhorn, Marcia C., and Tremayne, Soraya, 103–129. New York: Berghahn Books, 2012.Google Scholar
Tremayne, Soraya, “Law, Ethics and Donor Technologies in Shia Iran.” In Assisting Reproduction, Testing Genes: Global Encounters with New Biotechnologies, ed. Birenbaum-Carmeli, Daphna, and Inhorn, Marcia C. New York: Berghahn Books, 2009.Google Scholar
Tremayne, Soraya, “Whither Kinship? Assisted Reproductive Technologies and Relatedness in the Islamic Republic of Iran.” In Assisted Reproductive technologies in the Third Phase, ed. Hampshire, Kate, and Simpson, Robert. New York: Berghahn Books, 2015.Google Scholar
Tremayne, Soraya, and Akhondi, Mohammad Mehdi. “Conceiving IVF in Iran.” Reproductive Biomedicine & Society Online 2 (2016): 62–70.Google ScholarPubMed
Soraya., Tremayne, “And Never the Twine Shall Meet”. In Reproductive Agency, Medicine and the State: Cultural Transformations in Childbearing, ed. Unnithan-KUmar, Maya. New York: Berghahn Books, 2004.Google Scholar
M, Yazdi, “Infertility Treatment and its Jurisprudential Approach.” Fiqh-e Al-e Beyt 5 (1996):5-6. http://ensani.ir/fa/article/journal/بیت-اھل-فقھ/3Google Scholar