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Paper short abstract:

This paper presents a case study of transnational egg donation from Turkey to Northern Cyprus from the perspective of Turkish egg donors by asking: How do these young women identify themselves as “not-mothers” (Almeling 2011), given social expectations and pressures on women to be “good mothers”?

Paper long abstract:

Transnational egg donation involves novel configurations of reproductive medicine, travel and exchange. Focusing on egg donors who embody the "supply side" of this phenomenon, this paper presents a case study of transnational egg donation between Turkey and Northern Cyprus. Since the late 1980s, In Vitro Fertilization has been accessible in Turkey only to married couples to create a child using their own gametes. All forms of third-party reproduction are strictly banned. Owing to the legal restrictions at home, increasing numbers of Turkish citizens with financial means are covertly travelling abroad, especially to neighboring Northern Cyprus, to access third-party reproductive services, predominantly anonymous egg donation. This emerging transnational reproductive travel from Turkey to Northern Cyprus involves the cross-border movement of not only Turkish couples seeking donated eggs but also young Turkish women donating their eggs. Based on observing egg donors' visits to one small privately-owned Northern Cypriot IVF clinic and conducting interviews with them, I explore the multiple meanings that young women who travel in secrecy for "cycling overseas" (Whittaker & Speier 2010) attribute to egg donation within the realities of their lives, and how they articulate notions of kinship in relation to "selling eggs," "helping" and "care-giving." This paper contributes to the emerging anthropological literature on "reproductive tourism" by exploring transnational anonymous egg donation from the perspective of egg donors, focusing on their moral narratives of egg donation. How do they identify themselves as "not-mothers" (Almeling 2011), given gendered social expectations and pressures on women to be "good mothers"?