Relative strangers: negotiating non-genetic kinship in the context of assisted conception

Petra’s research is located in the sociology of medicine and technology, gender and sexuality, and family and kin relationality. Her specific area of interest is reproductive technologies and the way in which they impact on family and kin life and relationships. Her doctoral research explored lesbian couple’s experiences of pursuing donor conception together. Petra’s current research looks at the implications of assisted donor conception on wider family relationships through her study ‘Relative strangers: negotiating non-genetic kinship in the context of assisted conception’, (together with Professor Carol Smart (PI)), funded by the UK Economic and Social Research Council. During her 2012 stay at the Brocher Foundation she is working on a paper about the process of bringing kinship into being in the context of assisted conception, and she is also coding, analysing data and preparing a book proposal from her current research.