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Short abstract:

Drawing on empirical data, this paper utilises Latour’s notion of Matters of Concern to explore tensions that arise, and various spaces in which they emerge, in relation to contraceptive knowledge practices.

Long abstract:

A myriad of contraceptive technologies are available in the UK; existing literature has illuminated some tensions which arise during contraceptive appointments; through the process of risk assessment (Geampana, 2019), the framework of individual choice (Mann, 2022), and the arena of decision making (Dalessandro et al., 2021). Drawing on empirical data, this paper employs a feminist STS approach to explore agencies of human and non-human actants at play in contraceptive knowledge practices. Data collection involved Instagram netnography, surveys, and interviews with contraceptive users and providers. My findings demonstrate conflicting understandings between the ways contraceptive technologies are approached and interpreted. For providers, contraception symbolises care, ease, and protection from unplanned pregnancies; patients are framed as vulnerable. Whilst contraceptive users express concern regarding the materiality of the technologies, citing potential risks and (side) effects. Opening up contraception as a research site for examining the contestation of medical knowledge practices, I explore how providers’ knowledge often distorts their perception about patient knowledge. So much so, that at times they are unable to acknowledge patients in severe pain. In developing an analysis of these tensions, the paper examines Instagram as a site for contesting contraceptive knowledge production. I show how it provides a platform for users to not only share their stories, but to question the status of facts and evidence in medical knowledge. I argue this provides a space for contestation: It is shared health information that stimulates users to call into question medical knowledge and to privilege their own experiential and tinkering practices.