{"id":1352,"date":"2026-01-06T23:23:33","date_gmt":"2026-01-06T23:23:33","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sites.temple.edu\/stsnetwork\/?page_id=1352"},"modified":"2026-01-07T04:30:42","modified_gmt":"2026-01-07T04:30:42","slug":"past-meetings-2022-3","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/sites.temple.edu\/stsnetwork\/home\/past-meetings-2022-3\/","title":{"rendered":"Archived (2022-23)"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
<\/div>\n\n\n\n
\n\n\n\n

~Spring 2023~<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
\n\n\n\n
<\/div>\n\n\n\n

Monday, May 8, <\/strong>2023<\/h4>\n\n\n\n

Alyssa M. Newman, PhD, Georgetown University <\/h3>\n\n\n\n

Making Families, Choosing Race: Sperm Banks and the Limits of Diversity<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

The widespread use of assisted reproductive technologies, coupled with demographic and social change, are normalizing new family configurations that extend beyond biological kinship. Despite the new populations and family formations utilizing these technologies, sperm donor selection is dominated by heteronormative logics and an interest in family resemblance achieved through racial matching.<\/em> Yet the achievement of racial matching is hardly a given, as 70% of the sperm donors at banks across the United States are white. This talk will interrogate the racialized meanings assigned to donor sperm, drawing on interviews with interracial lesbian couples who encountered difficulties finding a donor of their desired racial background. This talk will also explore the sperm banks\u2019 \u201cdiversity problem,\u201d examining how, despite the fertility industry\u2019s quick embrace of diversifying family formations including queer clients and intended parents of color, it continues to center around the reproduction of the white family. In a context of increasing state control over reproduction, the rise of both regulated as well as unregulated sperm markets raises the question of who is being served, or controlled, in the presence or absence of state intervention and policy.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"<\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
<\/div>\n\n\n\n
\n\n\n\n

Monday, March 13, <\/strong>2023<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

STS NOW! \u2013 CONVERSATIONS IN SCIENCE, TECHNOLOGY, SOCIETY<\/em><\/h3>\n\n\n\n

Professor Erik Cordes (Department of Biology) <\/h3>\n\n\n\n

The Industrialization of the Deep Ocean: Can we avoid the Tragedy of the Commons on the High Seas?<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

As we struggle to move beyond fossil fuels and avoid the most catastrophic outcomes of global climate change scenarios, we are increasingly turning to the ocean and the emerging Blue Economy for solutions. Our fisheries are moving into deeper waters further offshore, we are drilling for oil and gas in places that were thought impossible a few years ago, and emerging industries like deep-sea mining and marine genetic resources are looking to international waters as a way to avoid the regulations and expense of working with the exclusive economic zones of nation-states. Currently, there are negotiations underway at the UN to govern these activities, which range from the designation of the management entity to the methodology for determining environmental impacts. Among these consideration is the proper valuation of ecosystem services and the creation of a global fund that would contain the dividends from the extraction of natural resources. Because these considerations are happening at a global scale, beyond areas of national jurisdiction, we have an opportunity to consider some new(ish) ideas related to ownership, nature\u2019s rights, and a global universal income. Time will tell whether any of these creative ideas gain traction in this forum.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n