The Politics of Remains: The Management of Productive and Moral Waste

Fertilized embryos, especially those that are “left over” from assisted reproductive technologies, as well as remains after medication abortions at home, have become a politicized part of social, cultural, as well as religious life of reproduction in the United States. What happens when the way we view waste, and specifically “remains,” in a Western, Christian society, like the United States, becomes imbued with discourses of religious veracity, nationalism, and population control? In The Accursed Share, Georges Bataille describes blood and tissue from the vagina (menstrual blood, birth, etc.) as dejected by Western society –we are disgusted by and scared of it, but at the same time we do not know what to do with it. Based on this notion, this project begins to uncover why, in our modern society, the fear of “remains” begins to control the ways we police pregnancy and reproductive capacities, through both religious and moral discourses.