Module 12 - Science, Technology, and Race Flashcards
Typological thinking
The idea that aspects of our world can be sorted into groups based on natural reseblances
racial thinking is like this - putting people into boxes based on phenotypic similarity - doesn’t hold much ground when thinking about the world on deeper level
Eugenics
movement
social policies aimed at
encouraging the upper classes
to reproduce more
enthusiastically and to
discourage the lower orders
from doing so - coined by Darwin’s cousin: Francis Galton - Gr phrase meaning ‘well born’ - to somehow ‘improve’ racial quality among the population in BRIT - Galtons idea was that BRIT was threat of degenerating due to decline in birth rates of high-class + in birth rate of low class -> advocate for politics to reproduce more enthusiastically + discouraged lower-class groups from doing to
Eugenics + the Americas
north American Eugenics movement arose - legislation of sterilization of individuals of groups that the state saw unfit
□ Institutionalized people, welfare people, indigenous peoples
□ Occurred without consent
§ Nazi’s inspired by NA Eugenics movement -> similar polices to AB + BC govt concerning this - this is Boas context + rising of theory
Montague on race etc
Montague: superficialness of race, races rep different mixtures of genetic material common across the genetic spectrum - took up historical particularism + pushed back on biological determinist framework - racial categories are a product of history + politics, is a cultural construction - still have an effect
DNA ancestry testing
was a rise in search services -> reflects desire in gen pop to learn about genetic pasts - interest in uncovering genetic ancestry -
□ Diasporic groups seeking to reconstruct, lost kinship links, adoptees looking for biologocal relatives, genealogists, curious etc
□ Can be used to trace heritable disease - however will also sell data to insurance co’s -> making it difficult to get health insurance -
□ Most interested is those interested in tracing family origins -
□ Marketing campaigns tell us about the cultures we are wrapped up in - ‘uniquely you’ ‘DNA tribe’ ‘ethnic origins’ - biological determinist thinking - you are your DNA -
Kim TallBear
says that pushing back on ideas rep in the commercial - we construct belonging + citizenship in ways that do not consider these DNA tests. Who claims you’ - often people lie on self identification - via culture + traditions imparted from ancestors
○ DNA co selling a hist related to biological variation not culture or emotional connection - they give message that your genes are closely tied, at some intrinsic level, to who you are as a person
Abel + Tsousie
family history + global politics of DNA tell us that indig peoples are wary of DNA tech, reason for this is that for many indigenous dependent on status resting on spec ancestral criteria - special rights + statues rel to ancestry - in land + resource acquisition
§ Whose right it is to give - infringes on entire families privacy
§ Can be used to target communities + for racial profiling
§ Call out current levels of ed around the ramifications of DNA testing
§ Crit the consent processes involved
§ Indig communitarianism - stressing this model of consent -
§ Also inc focus on DNA as a means to reconstruct genealogical relationships - to find ‘lost relatives’ + where they fit in family - see as positive step away from commodification of genetic relationships
How are DNA tests (DTC) a risk to privacy?
when submit, also submitting for most of family, are we all involved in this process? - no - should be more edu on what you’re getting involved with
Communitarianism:
emphasized the connection between the individual and the community - talk about it as a group - what is a group? What is community?
problems with using genetic tests
rights to privacy/risks to privacy
misunderstood/risks to the person not fully
explained
* use of these technologies in crime solving, but:
* such practices could be used to target
vulnerable communities or to reinforce racial
profiling
* lack of education and information
* informed consent forms
* absence of language regarding group risk
3 major forms of collective identity
§ Race - division based on physical phenotypes, based in presumed shared physical features, used alleged bio features to naturalize biological claims on difference -> cultural construct - deep social impact
§ Ethnicity - based on language, common ancestry, shared religion, history, customs - often confused with nationality, ethnicity is a product of culture -> cultural construct
□ Flemish in Belgium
§ Nation or nationality - citizens in a particular nation - special + top-down form of cultural identity, and imagined identity - mod states use this to give singular identity within a given soc - a legal status - also a cultural category, has a lot of social impact
