Baby's first picture : ultrasound and the politics of fetal subjects

Appearing through developments in medicine, in volatile debates over abortion rights, in popular guides to pregnancy, and in advertisements for cars and long-distance telephone plans, the foetus has become an increasingly familiar part of the social landscape in Canada.

Lisa Mitchell provides a critical anthropological perspective on the foetal subject, particularly as it emerges through the practice of ultrasound imaging."Seeing the baby" is now a routine and expected part of pregnancy and prenatal care in Canada.

Conventionally understood as a neutral and passive technology, ultrasound appears to be a "window" through which to observe foetal sex, age, size, physical normality, and behaviour.

However, Mitchell argues, what is seen through ultrasound is neither self-evident nor natural, but historically and culturally contingent and subject to a wide range of interpretation.