 | Magdalena Radkowska-Walkowicz Associate Professor - University of Warsaw |
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01.10.2020-30.10.2020
Anthropology of Turner syndrome. On girls, women, and medicine
TS produces mirrors, which reflect social entanglements, and expectations, especially those related to female bodies and female roles. Since TS is characterized by the partial or complete absence of an X chromosome, one can assume, that in a way, the lives of women with TS are devoted to recreating this missing X chromosome. At the centre of all TS-related issues and in everyday experiences of people with the diagnosis, lie questions related to femininity, reproduction, attractiveness, and gender roles.
Thus TS is a story about the body and its social perception. This is a story of being shackled by expectations and norms, but also of one’s resistance to them. Viewing TS allows one to see different problems of the modern world, in its local, Polish context. The case of Turner Syndrome shows how the biological and the social are inseparable in everyday experience, and how difficult it is to disentangle what in one’s life is due the biological condition (in this case: being born with a disease) and what is an outcome of the way in which the others react to this condition.
Magdalena Radkowska-Walkowicz is an associate professor at the Institute of Ethnology and Cultural Anthropology of the University of Warsaw, and the member of Childhood Studies Interdisciplinary Research Team. Her academic interest is in childhood and youth studies, medical anthropology, new reproductive technologies. She is the author of numerous articles (eg. in Children's Geographies, Reproductive Health Matters, European Journal of Women Studies, Journal of Religion and Health). She recently co-edited volumes: Turner Syndrome. Voices and experiences, Children and health. Introduction to chilhood studies and Child, in vitro, society. An interdisciplinary perspective (in Polish). Her recent research projects concern health (including Covid-19) as it is understood by children, and girls with Turner’s Syndrome.
ORCID: 0000-0002-4127-9592
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