Fetal Tissue: Reproductive Rights and Amateur Activist Video
Afterimage, Summer 1993, v. 21, no. 1, pp. 10-13
Patricia R. Zimmermann outlines how new technologies, at the time, such as personal camcorders and VCRs could be used as a tool to create and disseminate videos in support of women's reproductive rights and freedom. Invoking Donna Haraway's idea of the cyborg, Zimmermann argues that more easily accessible media technologies create cyborg-like videomakers who can travel between discourses, and offer previously unrepresented points of view. Videos created by groups such as the Media Coalition for Reproductive Rights, Paper Tiger Television and Reprovision are discussed in detail, as well as video work by Kathy High and Aline Mare. Zimmermann shows that these alternative media productions show visual images of women and pregnant women's bodies, which are not shown in mainstream and conservative anti-abortion media productions that usually showed images of the fetus.
ITEM 1993.157 – available for viewing in the Research Centre
Videos, Artworks and Artists Cited
Underexposed:Temple of the Fetus – Kathy High
Tongues Untied – Marlon Riggs
Spring of Lies – Media Coalition for Reproductive Rights
US Bans Abortion – Paper Tiger Television
Access Denied – Reprovision
S'Aline's Solution – Aline Mare