Queer Kinship

Privacy Concerns in Orphan Black

Dados Bibliográficos

ID21790307
AutoresMarcie Casey, Jay Clayton (0000-0002-3569-4853)
Ano2021
Volume14
Fascículo1-2
Páginas125-139
Data de publicação2021-12-31
Peer ReviewedSim
Open AccessSim
TipoARTICLE
PeriódicoThe Journal of Literature and Science (JOURNAL)
Identificadores do periódicoISSN: 1754-646X • E-ISSN: 1754-646X
EditoraJournal of Literature and Science (PUBLISHER)
DOI10.12929/jls.14.1-2.09
PMID36506248
OpenAlexW4311821710
IdiomaEN
Citações recebidas4
Referências citadas3

The acclaimed Canadian television series Orphan Black (2013)(2014)(2015)(2016)(2017) poses a question straight out of the pages of science fiction: What would it be like to encounter multiple versions of yourself in the form of clones that you never knew you had? Reared in completely different environments, each clone develops a unique personality, astonishingly portrayed by the actress Tatiana Maslany, who performs twelve different roles (often several in the same scene) over the course of the show's five seasons.From a scientific point of view, the clones' differentiation into distinct identities is the most accurate aspect of the show's premise (Hamner, Editing 95).But equally plausible in social terms are the bonds that begin to develop among the beleaguered figures, who are initially being hunted down by one of their own and later learn that they are under constant surveillance by an unethical corporation that is using them as experimental research subjects.As the show progresses, the network of relations they forgefacetiously christened the "Clone Club" -ends up offering viewers an alternative vision of kinship and sociality.The show's reconceptualization of the nuclear family, as it has been traditionally conceived in Western society, evokes phenomena that are already becoming common in today's world -both the "families of choice" described by Kath Weston in her book Families We Choose: Lesbians, Gays, Kinship (1991) and the genetic kin who are brought together via ancestry web sites, genetic testing services, and social media networks of donor-siblings 1 described by Rosanna Hertz and Margaret K. Nelson in Random Families: Genetic Strangers, Sperm Donor Siblings, and the Creation of New Kin (2018).This article explores the relationship between the alternative kinship networks in Orphan Black and these two real-world phenomena, concentrating on the privacy issues emerging almost weekly in news and other media accounts of individuals discovering new -often unexpected -kin.Orphan Black is unprecedented in setting both of these alternative family structures in dialogue with one another.The importance of LGBTQIA+ families is foregrounded by the prominence of queer sexuality in the show itself.The series features a range of same-gender sexual relationships, prominent in several storylines, as well as surrogate, adoptive, and voluntary families that cross national, linguistic, educational, generational, class, and lifestyle boundaries.As Hamner puts it, "Orphan Black treats all of its clones as figuratively queer" ("Sterility" 413, italics in original).Consequently, the show's queer allegiances transgress more than heterosexual norms. 2 The phenomenon of "genetic families" who bond over their newly discovered genetic relationship, is dramatized with equal prominence in the show.Together, these alternative family structures create novel social arrangements that challenge normative assumptions in multiple domains.Although the clones are genetically identical, they have each been brought up in different environments, and they manifest an array of personality traits and identities: a punk rock con artist named Sarah, who has sex with whomever she pleases and does not feel the need to categorize herself; a lesbian dread-headed graduate student studying evolutionary biology named Cosima; a quirky housewife and soccer mom, Alison, whose marriage reverses stereotypical gender roles by making her the head of household and having her husband take her last name; a trained killer, Helena, who is

Internet privacy · Kinship · Queer · Sociology · Anthropology · Computer Science · Demographic Trends and Gender Preferences · Gender Roles and Identity Studies · Gender Studies · Reproductive Health and Technologies