North American surrogate reproductive mobilities incited by cross-border reproductive care

The transnational mobility of intended parents traveling abroad for reproductive technologies has been heavily accounted for and theorized. On the other hand, scholars have emphasized the immobility of surrogates in places like India, Nepal and Cambodia. In order to extend an examination of how reproductive travel informs mobility, this paper will turn a critical eye toward North American surrogates’ reproductive mobilities that are incited by their participation in cross-border reproductive care. Surrogates in the United States are strikingly different from the images presented of surrogates in India. In fact, when the North American surrogates cycle for international intended parents, in some aspects they become less and more mobile. This paper will focus on multiple types of reproductive mobilities that are involved in the global fertility industry when international intended parents travel to North America for assisted reproduction.