Wayward Relations: Novel Searches of the Donor-Conceived for Genetic Kinship

ABSTRACTSearching and finding supposedly anonymous sperm donors or half-siblings by diverting direct-to-consumer genetic testing is a novel phenomenon. I refer to such new forms of kinship as ‘wayward relations,’ because they are often officially unintended and do not correspond to established kinship roles. Drawing on data mostly from the United Kingdom, Germany and the United States, I argue that wayward relations are a highly contemporary means of asserting agency in a technological world characterized by tensions over knowledge acquisition. I make the case that such relations reaffirm the genetic grounding of kinship, but do not displace other ways of relating—they are complementary not colonizing. Wayward relations challenge the gate-keeper status of fertility clinics and regulators over genetic knowledge and classical notions of privacy.