Cultural Capital
The formation of cultural capital is relatively complex and often
negatively accumulated. Before the bill was revised, despite the legal
permissibility of commercial surrogacy, surrogates claim that they often
face dilemmas and social condemnation for surrogacy being easily
imagined as and associated with extra-marital relationships for
“sexualized care work” (Pande, 2010: 142). Unaware by the public of
the fact that surrogacy could occur without sexual intercourses,
surrogacy is often mislabelled as sinful “dirty work” (Pande, 2014:
155) trapped with “moral taints” (Hughes, 1951). Having recognized
that cultural capital accumulation is a historical process,
for a patriarchal society like
India, surrogacy is never an accepted practice in the community, and
women are often not welcomed to engage with renumerated activities
outside the home. Married women are required to conform traditionally to
their husband and their body is only acceptable for childbearing and
nurturing of the family. To protect and preserve the reputation of their
family, some surrogates also tend not to notify their larger family of
their pregnancy commitment (Pande 2009b), while others, in the very last
months of pregnancy, choose to seclude themselves in the medical
facilities’ dormitories temporarily avoiding criticism.
In short, the deeply rooted cultural constraints have negatively
affected the forming and accumulating of the “embodied” form11Indicating
the long-lasting dispositions of surrogates’ mind and body. of
cultural capital for surrogates, and the commercialization of the
motherhood aligning with moral condemnation on “cultural knowledge and
practices” has indeed contrasted surrogates’ rights towards surrogacy
(Rozée et al, 2020: 10). Meanwhile, it creates a high threshold to
barricade the convertibility of cultural capital to economic (i.e.,
increase income) and social capital.