This course seeks to pose the field of genetics, and the scientists working in it, in/as a cultural context. Doing so, it helps students understand genetics both as a field of scientific knowledge production, as well as a highly relevant site for rethinking some of the more general concepts in anthropology. It offers insights into the ways genetic theories, ideas, and concepts inform and shape societies. How are increasingly popular genetic ancestry tests for example changing and challenging notions of kinship, identity and belonging? What does it mean when we read in advertisements that something is “in our genes”, or when a test result shows that we are 13.5% Viking? How are time and temporality being refigured through promises made in large-scale genetic projects such as the Human Genome Project or precision medicine? And what do the high-tech environments of scientific laboratories have in common with traditional anthropological fieldsites? Besides weekly readings of texts by anthropologists and science and technology scholars, the course also wants to cultivate genuine curiosity for scientific knowledge practices, specifically genetics, in order to appreciate their societal impact and relevance. As such it offers materials and field trips that help the students gain a concrete understanding of the matter. In addition, the students will be given small ethnographic assignments to do at home, and asked to take responsibility for seminar sessions through the preparation of presentations.
- Kursverantwortliche/r: Roos Anne Hopman