merete lie

New medical imaging technologies enable the production of photos of human cells that are magnified to make them visible to the eye. Such cellular images have gained aesthetic as well as dramatic appeal, as they have moved out of the laboratories and become available for the public. At this stage, they are refashioned to reveal matters more clearly and pedagogically. Organic matter that might be confusing to the audience is removed and colours added to distinguish various aspects—but despite such manipulations, the result appears as images of real human cells, making them different from drawings and models. One example of this is the website of a Norwegian governmental organization for information on biotechnology and bioethics which displays images of egg and sperm cells related to techniques of assisted reproduction. These images represent cells as autonomous and independent of human gendered bodies. The process whereby cells culturally become detached and disassociated from human bodies is here referred to as a process of entification whereby the cells reappear as detachable, usable entities.

The new reproductive technologies affect several of our conceptual distinctions, and most basically the one between nature and culture. This includes the understanding of reproduction as natural, biological processes and of the body as a product of nature. Nature and culture has been a basic conceptual distinction in western culture and it is paralleled in the division between sex, understood as nature, and gender, understood as culture. The process of reproduction is central to the understanding of sexual difference, in the sense that the abilities to conceive and give birth to children are generally considered to be features that distinguish woman from man. Therefore changes in this process provide us with empirical material for exploring changes in people's understanding of sex and gender. The article explores reproductive technology as a provider of new cultural models for understanding the relationship between nature and culture and thereby the distinction of sex/nature and gender/culture.

The special situation of women workers as compared to men is most often explained by women's role in the family. Another and often neglected explanation of their work behavior is that most women have working conditions different from those of men. The article gives a detailed analysis of how working conditions in typical female industrial work limit women's possibilities for influence within the organization. The results of a study of three Norwegian industrial plants are presented.

Most studies of women working in foreign-owned industries in Southeast Asia have directed their attention to the transnational corporations (TNCs). Here, rather small Norwegian-owned companies are the focus of study, concentrating on one case in Southern Johor. Asking whether the nationality of the company makes any difference to the workers and whether we can trace a Scandinavian tradition of industrial relations, we found that it is rather the rural location and the local adaptation of the company that makes it different from the TNCs. Focus is on the relation between a foreign company and a rural community, thus on the interplay between different development strategies.