This article discusses how seven young people born to lesbian mothers and conceived using donor insemination negotiate positions with their donor figuration. ‘Negotiation’ here refers to processes in which the donor figure, his offspring or both are in motion, and in which the motion physically and relationally positions them in relation to each other. The article illuminates the differences in negotiations between the donor being an anonymous figuration and a ‘negotiated absence’ (Donovan, 2000), or a known and physical present figure. However, the analyses show that the positions between the donor figure and his offspring are constantly in motion, irrespective of the donors’ anonymity or not. This indicates that the anonymous/known dichotomy is not entirely useful in explaining the different ways in which donors are configured in planned lesbian families.
BarrB (2009) Regnbuefamilier i Danmark, Sverige og Norge. In: Regnbågsfamiljers ställning i Norden. Politik, rättigheter och vilkor [Rainbow Families in Denmark, Sweden and Norway, in Rainbow Families in the Nordic Countries. Politics, rights and conditions], Oslo: NIKK Publications, pp. 17–174.
2.
BeckerGButlerANachtigallRD (2005) Resemblance talk: A challenge for parents whose children were conceived with donor gametes in the US. Social Science & Medicine61(6): 1300–1309.
3.
BosHMWHakvoortEM (2007) Child adjustment and parenting in planned lesbian families with known and as-yet unknown donors. Journal of Psychosomatic Obstetrics & Gynecology28(2): 121–129.
4.
Bos HMW and Gartrell NK (2010) Adolescents of the US National Longitudinal Lesbian Family Study: The Impact of Having a Known or an Unknown Donor on the Stability of Psychological Adjustment. Available at: http://www.nllfs.org/images/uploads/pdf/NLLFS-adolescents-donor-2010.pdf (accessed 12 June 2014).
5.
BraidottiR (1994) Nomadic Subjects. Embodiment and Sexual Difference in Contemporary Feminist Theory, New York: Columbia University Press.
6.
BraidottiR (2002) Metamorphoses. Towards a Materialist Theory of Becoming, Cambridge: Polity Press.
7.
BraidottiR (2006) Transpositions. On Nomadic Ethics, Cambridge: Polity Press.
8.
BrewaeysAPonjaertI (1997) Donor insemination: Child development and family functioning in lesbian mother families. Human Reproduction12(6): 1349–1359.
9.
Burell R (2005) Assisted Reproduction in the Nordic Countries. Copenhagen: Nordic Committee on Bioethics: Nordic Council of Ministers.
10.
CarstenJ (2004) After Kinship, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
11.
ChabotJMAmesBD (2004) ‘It wasn’t “let’s get pregnant and do it”‘: Decision making in lesbian couples planning motherhood via donor insemination. Family Relations53(4): 348–356.
12.
ChanRWRaboyBPattersonCJ (1998) Psychological adjustment among children conceived via donor insemination by lesbian and heterosexual mother. Child Development69(2): 443–457.
13.
ClarkeVKitzingerC (2005) ‘We’re not living on planet lesbian’: Constructions of male role models in debates about lesbian families. Sexualities8(2): 137–152.
14.
DempseyD (2012) More like a donor or more like a father? Gay men’s concepts of relatedness to children. Sexualities15(2): 156–174.
15.
DonovanC (2000) Who needs a father? Negotiating biological fatherhood in British lesbian families using self-insemination. Sexualities3(2): 148–164.
16.
DonovanC (2006) Genetics, fathers and families: Exploring the implications of changing the law in favour of identifying sperm donors. Social and Legal Studies15(4): 494–510.
17.
DonovanCWilsonAR (2008) Imagination and integrity: Decision-making among lesbian couples to use medically provided donor insemination. Culture, Health & Sexuality: An International Journal for Research, Intervention and Care10(7): 649–665.
18.
EhrensaftD (2008) Just Molly and me, and donor makes three: Lesbian motherhood in the age of assisted reproductive technology. Journal of Lesbian Studies12(2–3): 161–178.
19.
FjellTI (2003) På arvens fang, i den ubrutte linjens favntak? Om donorfamilier og adoptivfamilier og tetting av genetiske og biografiske hull [On the lap of inheritance, embracing the unbroken line? Donor families and adoptive families and filling the genetic and biographical gaps]. Tidsskrift for kulturforskning [Journal of Cultural Studies]2(2): 47–64.
20.
FlaksDFischerI (1995) Lesbians choosing motherhood: A comparative study of lesbian and heterosexual parents and their children. Developmental Psychology31(1): 105–114.
21.
FolgerøT (2008) Queer nuclear families? Reproducing and transgressing heteronormativity. Journal of Homosexuality54(1): 124–149.
22.
FranklinS (2000) Introduction. In: FranklinSLuryCStaceyJ (eds) Global Nature, Global Culture, London: SAGE, pp. 1–16.
23.
FulcherMSutfinELPattersonCJ (2008) Individual differences in gender development: Associations with parental sexual orientation, attitudes, and division of labor. Sex Roles58(5–6): 330–341.
24.
GabbJ (2004) Querying the incongruities within research on lesbian parent families. Sexualities7(2): 167–182.
25.
GartrellNBosHMW (2010) US national longitudinal lesbian family studies: Psychological adjustment of 17-year-old adolescents. Pediatrics126(1): 28–36.
26.
GolombokSPerryBBurstonA (2003) Children with lesbian parents: A community study. Developmental Psychology39(1): 20–33.
27.
HaimesEWeinerK (2000) ‘Everybody’s got a dad’. Issues for lesbian families in the management of donor insemination. Sociology of Health & Illness22(4): 477–499.
28.
HanssenJK (2007) Homoseksuelle foreldre – (U)vanlige familier? Ungdom, unge og voksnes oppveksterfaringer fra familier med homoseksuelle foreldre [Homosexual Parents – (Un)Common Families? Youth, Young Persons, and Grown-Ups’ Experiences from having Homosexual Parents]. Dansk Sociologi [Danish Sociology]18(3): 9–24.
29.
HanssenJK (2012) ‘My rainbow family’ – discomfort and the heteronormative logics. Young20(3): 237–256.
30.
HarawayD (1991) A cyborg manifesto: Science, technology, and socialist-feminism in the late twentieth century. In: HarawayD (ed.) Semians, Cyborgs and Women. The Reinvention of Nature, London: Free Association Books, pp. 149–181.
31.
HewittG (2002) Missing links: Identity issues of donor-conceived people. Journal of Fertility Counselling9(3): 14–20.
32.
HobsonBMorganD (2002) Introduction. In: HobsonB (ed.) Making Men into Fathers: Men, Masculinities and the Social Politics of Fatherhood, New York: Cambridge University Press, pp. 1–24.
33.
HolsteinJAGubriumJF (2004) The active interview. In: SilvermanD (ed.) Qualitative Research. Theory, Method and Practice, 2nd edn. London, Thousand Oaks and New Delhi: SAGE, pp. 140–161.
34.
JonesC (2005) Looking like a family: Negotiating bio-genetic continuity in British lesbian families using licensed donor insemination. Sexualities8(2): 221–237.
35.
LieM (2002) Science as father? Sex and gender in the age of reproductive technologies. European Journal of Women’s Studies9(4): 381–399.
36.
MacCallumFGolombokS (2004) Children raised in fatherless families from infancy: A follow-up of children of lesbian and single heterosexual mothers at early adolescence. Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry45(8): 1407–1419.
37.
NelkinD (2006) Gene as a cultural icon. In: ClarkeATicehurstF (eds) Living with the Genome, Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, pp. 171–176.
38.
NIKK Publications (2009) Regnbågsfamiljers ställning i Norden. Politik, rättigheter och vilkor [Rainbow Families in the Nordic Countries. Politics, rights and conditions] (Nordisk Informasjon för Kunskap om Kön.[Nordic Information on Gender]), Gothenburg: NIKK Publikationer.
39.
NordquistP (2010) Out of sight, out of mind: Family resemblances in lesbian donor conception. Sociology44(6): 1128–1144.
40.
Ot.prp. no. 33(2007–2008): Om lov om endringer i ekteskapsloven, barnelova, adopsjonsloven, bioteknologiloven mv [Amendments to the Marriage Act, the Children Act, the Adoption Act, the Biotechnology Act etc.]. (felles ekteskapslov for heterofile og homofile par [the Gender-Neutral Marriage Act]).
41.
PattersonCJ (1992) Children of lesbian and gay parents. Child Development63(5): 1025–1042.
42.
PattersonCJ (2005) Lesbian and gay parents and their children: Summary of research findings. In: Lesbian and Gay Parenting: A Resource for Psychologists, 2nd edn. Washington, DC: American Psychological Association.
43.
PlummerK (2005) Documents of Life 2, London: SAGE.
44.
Ryan-FloodR (2005) Contested heteronormativities: Discourses of fatherhood among lesbian parents in Sweden and Ireland. Sexualities8(2): 189–204.
45.
ScheibJERiordanMRubinS (2005) Adolescents with open-identity sperm donors: Reports from 12–17-year-olds. Human Reproduction20(1): 239–252.
46.
SchneiderD (1968) American Kinship. A Cultural Account, Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall.
47.
ShannerLHarrisRBlythE (2002) Building families through donor conception: An international forum on the personal, professional and public policy issues: 22–23 June 2002. Journal of Infertility Counselling9(2): 18–21.
48.
SOU (2001) Barn i homosexuella familjer [Children in Homosexual Families] (SOU 10), Stockholm: Statens Offentliga Utredringar [Swedish White Paper].
49.
SpilkerK (2007) Teknologiske trekanter? Om assistert reproduksjon i et komplisert normativt landskap [Technological triangles? Assisted Reproduction in a complex, normative Landscape]. In: AndersenBAnnfeltTBolsøA (eds) Når heteroseksualiteten må forklare seg [When Heterosexuality has to be explained], Trondheim: Tapir.
50.
StaceyJBiblarzTJ (2001) (How) does the sexual orientation of parents matter?American Sociological Review66(2): 159–183.
51.
StrathernM (1992) After Nature. English Kinship in the Late Twentieth Century, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
52.
StrathernM (1995) Displacing knowledge: Technology and the consequences for kinship. In: GinsburgFDRappR (eds) Conceiving the New World Order. The Politics of Reproduction, Berkeley, LA and London: University of California Press, pp. 346–363.
53.
SullivanM (2004) Family of Woman: Lesbian Mothers, Their Children, and the Undoing of Gender, Berkeley: University of California Press.
54.
TaskerF (2005) Lesbian mothers, gay fathers, and their children: A review. Developmental Behavioral Pediatrics26(3): 224–240.
55.
TaskerFGolombokS (1995) Adults raised as children in lesbian families. American Journal of Orthopsychiatry65(2): 203–215.
56.
TaskerFGolombokS (1997) Growing up in a Lesbian Family, New York: Guilford Press.
57.
TaskerFPattersonCJ (2007) Gay and lesbian parenting in context. Research on gay and lesbian parenting: Retrospect and prospect. Journal of GLBT Family Studies3(2/3): 9–34.
58.
VanfraussenKPonjaert-KristoffersenIBrewaeysA (2002) What does it mean for youngsters to grow up in a lesbian family created by means of donor insemination?Journal of Reproduction and Infant Psychology20(4): 237–252.
59.
VanfraussenKPonjaert-KristoffersenIBrewaeysA (2003) Why do children want to know more about the donor? The experiences of youngsters raised in lesbian families. Journal of Psychosomatic Obstetrics & Gynecology24(1): 31–38.
60.
Van GelderenLBosHMWGartrellN (2012) Quality of life of adolescents raised from birth by lesbian mothers: The US national longitudinal family study. Journal of Developmental & Behavioral Pediatrics33(1): 1–7.
61.
WainrightJLRussellSTPattersonCJ (2004) Psychological adjustment, school outcomes, and romantic relationships of adolescents with same-sex parents. Child Development7(6): 886–898.
