Infertility, Technology, & Muslim Women in India | Dr Zairu Nisha | Research Seminar

In this Research Seminar, Dr Zairu Nisha (University of Delhi) explores infertility among Muslim women in India through feminist bioethics and phenomenology. She introduces the concept of the body as a site of moral injury, showing how reproductive expectations, religious belief, and assisted reproductive technologies shape women’s moral identities and lived experiences.Drawing on thinkers such as Maurice Merleau-Ponty and Simone de Beauvoir, Dr Nisha challenges mind–body dualism and argues that the body is not separate from the self, but a moral subject formed through relationships with others. When infertility disrupts social and religious expectations of womanhood and motherhood, women experience guilt, shame, and alienation — not because of moral failure, but because they are caught between conflicting moral worlds.

Read more or watch the full seminar:Audio Chapters:

0:00 - Introduction

2:40 - Self and Body Dichotomy

04:53 - The Lived-Body in a Lived World

07:35 - Embodiment and Moral Injury

12:27 - Female Body and Reproduction

15:30 - Infertility and Moral Problem

17:55 - Technology and Motherhood

22:24 - Muslim Women and Reproduction

25:26 - Conclusion: Towards Moral Repair