transgressions
Nandagiri, R., & Pizzarossa, L. B. (2023). Transgressing biomedical and legal boundaries: The “enticing and hazardous” challenges and promises of a Self-Managed Abortion multiverse. Women's Studies International Forum (Vol. 100, p. 102799). Pergamon. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.wsif.2023.102799
The second “Lucíta Nandarossa” piece, we argue that medical abortion pills are more than just a reproductive technology or a method for service provision; but instead hold revolutionary and transgressive/transformative potential.
This article is part of a Special Issue convened by Dr Ben Kasstan and Prof Sheelagh McGuinness. We presented some of our initial thinking at a workshop convened by them at CHLS Bristol in October 2021.
Our article reflects on this idea of “transgression”, arguing self-managed abortion (SMA) troubles the dominant paradigms in abortion research (i.e., the medico-legal frameworks, and the presumption of individual decision-making). Despite the shifts in law and medicine around the world that acknowledge and incorporate medical abortion pills; these remain forms of “permissible transgressions”.
SMA, we contend, fundamentally challenges and alters meanings of abortion, and its care and provision: from whose authority and knowledge is valued and centred, to the environments that abortion is possible in, to issuing a broader challenge around how abortion itself is understood and depicted, and how SMA, thus, represents a deliberate move towards new ways of making meaning and (re)imagining abortions.
We received very favourable reviews for this article - a reviewer suggested publishing as is, and reviewer 2 suggested some minor changes. Reviewer 3 was less enthused by our article - not because they disagreed with the content of it, necessarily, but because of more personal/political points they took issue with. We incorporated as much of their feedback as possible, but also contested some of their points; particularly where they suggested our work was in some way “jumping on the bandwagon” of abortion. I think our collective work in this space is a strong enough refutation.