Pregnancy remains, infant remains, or the corpse of a child? The incoherent governance of the dead foetal body in England

Abstract

In English law, the conventional view is that human personhood is produced by live birth, kinship is produced by relations between persons, and corpses are produced on the death of persons, which are then buried or cremated. Beings produced by human pregnancy which do not fit these discursive categories are classified as ‘pregnancy remains’, have no personhood or kinship, and their disposal is regulated as human tissue. However, this paper argues that the governance of the dead, born, foetal body in England, in fact, produces forms of foetal personhood, through the regulation of the material dead bodies of foetuses and babies. Furthermore, the assignment of responsibility for disposal and post-mortem decisions to kin of the dead foetal being also produces a relational form of foetal personhood. The examination of second-trimester pregnancy loss in England through fieldwork with women who have experienced foetal death, premature labour, and termination for foetal anomaly before 24 weeks’ gestation reveals how governance of the dead, born, foetal body in England is incoherent.It also illustrates the effects of this incoherence on parental choices about the range of actions available after pregnancy loss in relation to the material body of the foetal being or baby.