Fetus By Any Other Name: How Words Shaped the Fetal Personhood Movement in US Courts and Society (1884-1973)A
But this isn’t a history of events—of names and dates and typical details. This is a history of words. In the twenty-first century, words used to discuss embryos and fetuses are split. Some people use humanizing language like “unborn children” and “human life.” Others use technical words like “embryos” and “fetuses.” I studied what words people used historically. I charted how words moved from science to the public to the law, and how they impacted court rulings on fetal personhood.
The use of certain words nudged courts to grant additional rights to embryos and fetuses. In the 1960s, writers began describing the science of development, using words like “unborn child” and humanizing descriptions to make embryos and fetuses seem like people already born. That helped build an idea of embryos and fetuses as having “life” before birth. When people began asking courts to legalize abortion care in the 1970s, attorneys on the opposite side argued that embryos and fetuses were “human life,” and that that “life” began at conception.
In those cases, “life” was biologically defined as when sperm fertilized egg, but it was on that biological definition “life” that judges improperly rested their legal rulings that embryos and fetuses were “potential human life” states had a duty to protect. It wasn’t legal personhood, but it was a legal status that let states pass laws restricting abortion care and punishing pregnant people for their behavior, trends that threaten people’s lives and autonomy in the twenty-first century.]]>autAbboud, CarolinathsMaienschein, JanedgcJustice, GeorgedgcMarchant, GarydgcPyne, StephenpblArizona State UniversityengDoctoral Dissertation Biology 2020https://hdl.handle.net/2286/R.I.5719100Doctoral DissertationAcademic theses352 pages115910175401630032421158243adminIn Copyright2020TextLanguageLawAbortionfetal personhoodLanguageScience and lawUS courtsWords