Dr Ilke Turkmendag

Lecturer in Law Innovation & Society

Email: ilke.turkmendag@ncl.ac.uk
Telephone: +44 (0) 191 208 4342
Personal Website: http://newcastle.academia.edu/IlkeTurkmendag
Address: 21-24 Windsor Terrace
Newcastle Law School
Newcastle upon Tyne
NE1 7RU
United Kingdom

Background

Introduction

I have a PhD in Genetics and Society (Institute for Science and Society and School of Law, University of Nottingham), and a Master’s degree in Science and Technology Studies (University of Oslo). My PhD was supervised by Prof Robert Dingwall (Institute for Science and Society) and Prof Thérèse Murphy (School of Law). My doctoral work concerned the social and ethical implications of the removal of donor anonymity from gamete donors in the UK. I explored the reactions of would-be parents to this legal shift through semi-structured interviews and a virtual ethnography study on an online patient support group.

After the completion of my doctoral work I joined the Policy, Ethics and Life Sciences Research Centre (PEALS) at Newcastle University, which has provided a deep understanding in evidence based bioethics. Between January 2010-2012, I worked as a Post Doctoral Research Associate in 'Interdisciplinary Approaches to the Uses of Reproductive Tissue in Stem Cell Science', a project led by Professor Erica Haimes.

In 2011, I was granted a Mildred Blaxter Postdoctoral Fellowships funded by the Foundation of Sociology of Health and Illness to disseminate the findings from my PhD thesis.

http://www.shifoundation.org.uk/?page_id=174

During the fellowship I published in four main areas: the role of patient support groups in policymaking; cross border reproductive care movements by UK patients; Turkish assisted conception regulations; and the right to personal identity claims in donor conception.

After completion of my fellowship, in February 2014, I joined Sheffield University to help coordinating the activities towards preparing large grant applications, as well as developing my own grant proposals. I also taught 'Social Theory and Analysis' and 'Sociology of the New Genetics' and supervised 3rd year students for their final dissertations in Sociology. In Sheffield I also coordinated the activities of the Biosociety Network and played role in launching a new university research centre, iHuman:

https://www.sheffield.ac.uk/faculty/social-sciences/ihuman

In February 2016 I joined the Newcastle Law School as a Lecturer in Law, Innovation, and Society. The group aims to address challenges broadly relating to:

the role of law in regulating innovation, and
innovation within law and legal institutions.

Please visit Law, innovation, and Society School Research Group's webpage: http://www.ncl.ac.uk/nuls/research/groups/lisgroup/ for more information about our research activities.

I am a member of Executive Committee of Socio-Legal Studies Association.

http://www.slsa.ac.uk/index.php/executive-committee

Qualifications

Ph.D, The Institute for Science and Society (ISS) and School of Law, University of Nottingham.

‘The Removal of Donor Anonymity in the United Kingdom: The Silencing of Claims by Would-be Parents’ (Awarded 07.2009)
Supervised by Prof Robert Dingwall and Prof Therese Murphy

MA, European Studies of Society, Science and Technology , The Centre for Technology, Innovation and Culture (TIK), University of Oslo, Norway.

‘Embryo in the Parliament: The British Parliament Debate on the Embryo Technology’. (Awarded 12.2003)
Supervised by Prof Torben Nielsen

Bachelor of Business Administration, Faculty of Political Science, Ankara University, Turkey.

Previous Positions

Research Associate at Department of Sociological Studies, University of Sheffield.

Mildred Blaxter Post Doctoral Fellow, PEALS, Newcastle University.

Post Doc Research Associate at PEALS, Newcastle University.

Part time teacher, University of Nottingham.

Senior Auditor, KPMG, Istanbul.

Research

I have two main areas of research interests. The first is the socio-legal and ethical issues associated with biomedicine, and the second focuses on regulation of emerging medical technologies. Owing to my background, I bring a distinctive interdisciplinary approach to my research which enables me to apply insights and perspectives from science and technology studies, bioethics, and law. I explored the social, ethical and legal aspects of gamete donation, and focused on right-to-know claims by donor conceived adults. I examined the public debate on the novel mitochondrial replacement techniques, and the construction of rights in the regulatory process. I analysed the ways in which developments in epigenetics research influence the ways in which maternal responsibility and rights are perceived. With a small team of lawyers and bioethicists I have conducted a pilot project to examine the the ethical, legal and social implications of new health technologies, involving the Human Fertilisation and Embryology Authority. Currently, I am interested in the socio-legal construction of the human genome editing techniques.

I am a Co-Investigator in a ESRC funded project on epigenetics: EpiStressNet: A biosocial systems approach to understanding the epigenetic embedding of social stress responses.

http://gtr.rcuk.ac.uk/projects?ref=ES/N000528/1

To date, my research has been published in leading international peer-reviewed journals and as book chapters in high profile edited collections resulting from research council-funded (ESRC and AHRC) projects. I also act as a referee for numerous journals including the Journal of Medical Ethics, New Genetics and Society, Reproductive Biomedicine Online, Human Reproduction, Sociology of Health and Illness, and Bioethics and as a peer reviewer for the Wellcome Trust, ESRC, and Fonds voor Wetenschappelijk Onderzoek-Vlaanderen (FWO), Belgium.

Research Interests

Ethical and socio-legal issues around human reproduction technologies, stem cell research, and reproductive tissue donation
Regulation of human reproduction technologies
Child's 'right-to know' in donor conception and mitochondrial replacement techniques
Cross border reproductive care (CBRC) movements
Epigenetics and maternal responsibility
Socio-legal issues around the human genome editing techniques

Teaching

Postgraduate Teaching .

LAW 1110 Legal Institutions and Method

LAW 3024 Medicine and the Law (Module leader)

LAW 3098 Dissertation (Module leader)

LAW 8090 Legal Research Skills and Methods (Module leader)

LAW 8152 Theory and Methods of Research (Module leader)

Publications

Turkmendag I. Heritable genome editing ‘morally permissible’ but will require ‘international consensus’. LLB News, 2018. Available at: https://www.lexisnexis.com/uk/legal/results/enhdocview.do?docLinkInd=true&ersKey=23_T27731591051&format=GNBFULL&startDocNo=0&resultsUrlKey=0_T27731591054&backKey=20_T27731591055&csi=281955&docNo=1&scrollToPosition=0.
Turkmendag I. It is just a 'battery': 'Right' to know in mitochondrial replacement. Science, Technology and Human Values 2018, 43(1), 56-85.
Hewitt M, Dingwall R, Turkmendag I. More than research intermediaries: a descriptive study of the impact and value of learned societies in the UK Social Sciences. Science and Public Policy 2017, 44(6), 775-788.
Hewitt M, Dingwall R, Turkmendag I. Squeeze on academics poses threats to learned societies. Research Fortnight 2017, 23-23.
Turkmendag I. The voice of silence: UK patients’ silent resistance to the assisted reproduction regulations. In: Cloatre, E; Pickersgill, M, ed. Knowledge, Technology and Law: At the Intersection of Socio-Legal and Science & Technology Studies. London, UK: Routledge, 2015.
Dingwall R, Hewitt I, Turkmendag I. Evaluation of Learned Societies Project 2014. May 2014, Academy of Social Sciences. 2014.
Murphy T, Turkmendag I. Kinship: Born and Bred (But also Facilitated)? A Commentary on 'Donor Conception: Ethical Aspects of Information Sharing' (Nuffield Council on Bioethics, London 2013). Medical Law Review 2014, 22(3), 422-433.
Turkmendag I. When sperm cannot travel: Experiences of UK would-be parents seeking treatment abroad. In: Flear, M.L., Farrell, A.M., Hervey, T.K., Murphy, T, ed. European Law and New Health Technologies. Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press, 2013, pp.362-380.
Haimes E, Taylor K, Turkmendag I. Eggs, ethics and exploitation? Investigating women's experiences of an egg sharing scheme. Sociology of Health and Illness 2012, 34(8), 1199-1214.
Turkmendag I. Home and Away: The Turkish Ban on Donor Conception. Law, Innovation and Technology 2012, 4(2), 144-164.
Turkmendag I. The Donor-conceived Child's `Right to Personal Identity': The Public Debate on Donor Anonymity in the United Kingdom. Journal of Law and Society 2012, 39(1), 58-75.
Turkmendag I, Dingwall R, Murphy T. The Removal of Donor Anonymity in the United Kingdom: The Silencing of Claims by Would-be Parents. International Journal of Law, Policy and the Family 2008, 22(3), 283-310.
Woods S, Scully JL, McCormack P, Turkmendag I. Response to report by Nuffield Council on Bioethics, Give and take? Human bodies in medicine and research: consultation summary. London: Nuffield Council on Bioethics, 2010. Available at: http://nuffieldbioethics.org/wp-content/uploads/Simon-Woods-Jackie-Leach-Scully-Pauline-McCormack-and-Ilke-Turkmendag-of-the-Policy-Ethics-and-Life-Sciences-Research-Centre.pdf.
Turkmendag I. Banchoff, T. Embryo Politics: Ethics and Policy in Atlantic Democracies. USA: Cornell University Press, 2011, £22.95 (hbk) viii+294pp, ISBN: 9780801449574. Sociology of Health and Illness 2012, 34(4), 646-647.
Turkmendag I. Review of ‘New Organs Within Us: Transplants and the Moral Economy (Experimental Futures)’. Sanal, A., Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 2011. Journal of Empirical Research on Human Research Ethics 2012, 7(1), 81-82.
Ozdemir I. Book Review: John R. Spencer and Antje Du Bois-Pedain (eds), Freedom and Responsibility in Reproductive Choice. Social & Legal Studies 2008, 17(3), 409-410.