The Egg and the Sperm

The Egg and the Sperm: How Science has constructed a Romance Based on Stereotypical Male-Female Roles. Emily Martin,Feminism &Science,edited by Evelyn Fox Keller and Helen E.Longino,Oxford Readings in Feminism,Oxford University Press,1996. Review:BayoumiAndil(sent on 12th Oct.2007) Metaphor is double-edged. It could be blurring as well as revealing. Suffice it to say that it''s usually constructive in the realm of Art, whereas in Science, be it social or natural, is not. However, it seems to be deeply-rooted in human sub-consciousness and perhaps this is why it proves to be more powerful than solid facts. In this framework, Science shoulders the task of combattting the "dim" side of metaphors One of these resembles human reproduction process to "planting a seed in soil". So it gives rise to the claim of folk theory that the origin and identity of the fetus comes from the male. This metaphor is the topic of the article of Emily Martin. Her goal was to shed light on the gender stereotypes hidden within the scientific language of biology. She starts by referring to all major scientific textbooks'' depiction of male and female reproductive organs as systems for the production of eggs and sperm. So within the female cycle, menstruation must necessarily be judged as a failure, more precisely "debris" of the uterine lining, resulting from the death of tissue. On the other hand, she says, male reproductive physiology is evaluated differently. She quotes, A.Vander and others, who describe the maturation of sperm in these enthusiastic words :"…Perhaps the most amazing characteristics of spermatogenesis is its sheer magnitude: the normal human male may manufacture seven hundred million sperm per day." It is also remarkable how "femininely" the egg behaves and how "masculinely" the sperm. The egg is seen as large and passive. It does not move, but "is transported" along fallopian tube. In contrast, sperm are small, and constantly active. They ''deliver'' their genes to the egg and ,''activate'' its developmental program.Some researchers liken the egg''s role to that of Sleeping Beauty: "a dormant bride awaiting for lover''s magic kiss, which instills the spirit that brings her to life." At most the age-old relationship of the egg and the sperm takes on a royal or religious aura. The egg coat, its protective barrier, is sometimes called its ''vestments'', a term usually reserved for sacred dress. It is holy, set apart and above, in other words, a queen/ king relationship. But Martin dismisses all this imagery as part of history. Citing an article in Cell published in the 1980s, she states: Sperm are cells with a limited behavioral repertoire, one that is directed toward fertilizing eggs, i.e."executing decisions" while filled with fear of high risk, resulting from difficult options. Then she calls to mind the only depiction known to her in Western civilization of sperm as weak and timid, instead of strong, powerful penetrator: A movie by Woody Allen , in which Allen is playing the part of an apprehensive sperm inside a man''s testicles, scared of the man''s approaching orgasm and reluctant to launch himself into the unknown. Martin also deplores the persistence of the age-old imagery quoting in this respect L. Fleck who describes what he termed "the self-contained nature of scientific thought" as follows: "the interaction between what is known, what remains to be learned, and those who are to apprehend it, go to ensure harmony within the system. But at the same time they also preserve the harmony of "its" illusions." Recently the researchers at Johns Hopkins university concluded that the sperm and the egg stick together because of adhesive molecules on the surfaces of each. The egg traps the sperm and adheres to it so tightly that the sperm''s head is forced to lie flat against the surface of the zona. i.e the outer layer of the egg. The trapped sperm continues to wiggle ineffectively. If the digestive enzymesrt to soften the zona just at its tip and the sides remain stuck, the fragile sperm can get oriented in the right direction and make it through the zona, provided that its bonds to the zona dissolve as it moves in. But this new version of the role of both the egg and the sperm helped little in changing the saga on the cultural level. Researchers who made the discovery themselves continued to write papers echoing the same time-worn metaphor of sperm as the active party who attacks , penetrates, and enters the egg. In the end, Martin urges on the waking up of sleeping meataphors in science about the egg and the sperm. Although the literary convention is to call, such metaphors ''dead'', they are not so much dead as sleeping, within the scientific language. Waking up these metaphors, by becoming aware of when we are projecting cultural imagery onto what we study, will improve our ability to investigate and understand nature, and in so doing, will rob those metaphors of their power to harm us through naturalizing our social conventions about gender.