The Social Construction of Personhood.

The current abortion controversy revolves around the opposing issues ofa woman's self- determination vs. the right of a fetus to be born. The thesis of this paper is that whet her a fetus is aborted or delivered depends to a great degree on how social groups and individuals construct its nature. If the fetus is "constructed" as a person it will be born; if it is viewed as something else it may be aborted. The paper examines how "person" is defined in philosophy, and how law and medicine have dealt with the human fetus. A "vocabulary of motives" is discussed as well as what happens when personhood is withdrawn, the consequences of "depersonalization" as seen in slavery and the Holocaust Finally, social characteristics and attitudes of the opposing groups who define the human fetus as a per- son or as a thing are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]