ABSTRACT
This essay is an attempt to think through and employ the concept of biosociality ethnographically. I begin this with a discussion of the concept of biosociality itself, then explore how this can be worked through Donna Haraway’s notion of “cyborg politics” (1991) and how that helps me to engage with the research material I’ve brought to this conversation. It moves ethnographically to a statement made by a key research participant in my study of Israeli ova donation. This is then used to frame three ethnographic biosocial moments in the practices of human ova extraction, exchange and implantation in an Israeli IVF clinic in Jerusalem. What emerges is a discussion of the politics of life and death in Israel (Foucault 1978). In so doing I explore how biosociality helps me to sustain a politically engaged and situated analysis of Israeli reproduction in a time of war.
