Alyssa M. Newman (she/her) is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Sociology and a Senior Research Scholar at the Kennedy Institute of Ethics at Georgetown University. Previously, she was a Hecht-Levi Postdoctoral Fellow at the Johns Hopkins Berman Institute of Bioethics and the Hixon-Riggs Early Career Fellow in Science and Technology Studies at Harvey Mudd College. Her research currently focuses on race and assisted reproductive technologies, as well as on institutional solutions to racial health disparities. She has also published extensively on multiraciality, exploring the topic through a variety of research projects relating to collective identity formation; biology and genetics; the intersection of mixedness and masculinity; immigration; as well as family relationships and reproduction. Her work can be found in journals such as Bioethics, New England Journal of Medicine, Sociology of Race and Ethnicity, and Medical Anthropology. Dr. Newman received her PhD in Sociology with a doctoral emphasis in Black Studies from the University of California Santa Barbara.
Research Project: Black Sperm Donor Availability in the United States
Although a significant demand for Black sperm donors exists, Black donors make up only 4% of the total donor population in sperm banks across the United States (Moreta, Simpson, Ghide, and Wiltshire 2022). In contrast, 70% of the donor population of these sperm banks are white (ibid). This study seeks to understand the contours of this disparity from two vantage points: factors preventing or facilitating the participation of Black men as sperm donors, as well as the impact of the Black sperm donor shortage on intended recipients. Much of our knowledge about the experiences, motivations, and preferences of sperm donors is based on overwhelmingly white samples, with very little data speaking to the experiences and motivations of Black donors (and non-donors). Black women, already impacted by exceptionally high and worsening maternal mortality rates (Gunja, Gumas, and Williams 2022), are forced into vulnerable positions when seeking Black donor sperm, with consequences ranging from delaying childbearing, selecting donors of a different racial background, seeking potentially risky donor arrangements, or foregoing their reproductive goals entirely. While media coverage highlighting the consequences of the underrepresentation of Black sperm donors, this research systematically explores the experiences of recipients seeking Black donor sperm, largely Black queer women and single women.