Biological crafts: A dialogical body remaking between intersex persons and their companions

Identifier:  imarina:9283369

Handle: https://hdl.handle.net/20.500.11797/imarina9283369

Authors:  Fernandez-Garrido, S

Abstract:
What are the testicles and who should we talk to to find out? What structures of women's bodies are left over and what are missing? What matters in a body? Starting from Donna Haraway's (2003) invitation to narrate "naturoculture" stories, in this article I am interested in how subaltern bodily narratives of intersex people and their companions change expert biologic knowledge, overflowing the classic dualisms of the clinic. I propose to read biology inside the "contact zone" (Pratt, 1992) in order to explore the remaking of the body that extend or reconfigure expert imaginaries. This crafting approach to biological knowledge leads to treating expert objects (hormones, gonads, etc.) as the provisional result of meaning negotiation processes. I argue that conceptualizing such objects as biological crafts allows us to expand the material cultures of biology to enable other bodies through conversations outside of expert/layman and nature/culture logics.