Random Families

Rosanna Hertz is the 1919 50th Reunion Professor of Sociology and Women's and Gender Studies at Wellesley College. She authored the widely acclaimed Single by Chance, Mothers by Choice, a path-breaking study of women who choose parenthood without marriage. She is frequently sought out by national media on issues related to women, work and changing families in contemporary society.Margaret K. Nelson is the A. Barton Hepburn Professor of Sociology Emerita at Middlebury College where she taught for four decades. Her books include Working Hard and Making Do: Surviving in Small Town America (with Joan Smith), and Parenting Out of Control: Anxious Parents in Uncertain Times.

• Introduction: Unprecedented RelationshipsPart I: Making Sense of the Donor and Donor Siblings Chapter 1. Choosing DonorsChapter 2. Inventing the Donor / Inventing the SelfChapter 3. Parents Make Contact with Genetic StrangersChapter 4. The Surprise of donor siblingsPart II: Networks of Donor SiblingsChapter 5. Michael's Clan: The Arrival of the FatherChapter 6. 7008 Builders: We are FamilyChapter 7. The Tourists: Just Related StrangersChapter 8. Connected Soul Mates: Emotional TiesChapter 9. The Social Capitalists: Joining The Preschoolers GroupChapter 10. Donor Sibling Networks: Continuity and ChangeConclusion: Choice in Donor Sibling Networks Appendix A: RespondentsAppendix B: Interviews, Virtual Ethnography And Language In The Book EndnotesBibliography

The scope of Random Families is astounding...Hertz and Nelson have made a significant contribution to what is an area of research in its infancy and have sparked an important conversation on what it means to be a family.