Nancy J. Kenney

Professor Kenney has been a member of the GWSS faculty since 1976. She holds a joint appointment with the Department of Psychology. She also serves as Director of Graduate Training for the GWSS department. Kenney’s research addresses the ways in which reproductive technologies influence women’s lives. Her work has addressed the questions of why women donate eggs to help others reproduce and the physical and emotional effects such donations have on donors. She is also interested in women’s attitudes toward ownership of/attachment to eggs donated for a specific reproductive purpose but unused for that purpose. The concept of what behaviors and characteristics define a “good mother” fascinates her and her upcoming work will attempt to reach an understanding of the concept by assessing how the concept is defined by women of various identities (ethnic/cultural/sexual/economic).