Nothing and Not-Nothing : Law's ambivalent response to transformation and transgression at the beginning of life

Ford, Mary; Smith, Stephen W. and Deazley, Ronan, eds. (2009) Nothing and Not-Nothing : Law's ambivalent response to transformation and transgression at the beginning of life. In: The Legal, Medical and Cultural Regulation of the Body. Ashgate Publishing, pp. 21-46. ISBN 978-0-7546-7736-9

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Abstract

Analysis of the embryo and foetus as, ‘gothic’. This label is used to describe the characteristics of the embryo/foetus as an as yet unformed human being. Thus, it has also been regarded as, according to observers writing in the fields of sociology and cultural studies, monstrous, abhuman, and liminal. The embryo/foetus is also ‘gothic’, as it is by its very nature in the process of transforming. Thus, it is also seen as metamorphic, undifferentiated, fragmented, and permeable. As a result of this, Ford argues, the law has been able to reject and cast out this abnormal Other and permit abortion and embryo research and, in regard to neonates, the separation of the conjoined twins.

ORCID iDs

Ford, Mary ORCID logoORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-2374-868X; Smith, Stephen W. and Deazley, Ronan
CORE (COnnecting REpositories)