One of the
points the article makes that I find to be very important is that “because race
has such profound social, political, and economic consequences, we should be
wary of allowing the concept to be redefined in a way that obscures its
historical roots and disconnects it from its cultural and socioeconomic
context” (400). I think that if the genetics testing were made more accurate
and reliable it could be a useful tool for helping people trace the geographic
regions to which their ancestors pertained. However, the problem really lies in
how people interpret the data obtained from these biological markers.
Perhaps I
am a bit biased in saying this since I am one of the people who cannot
definitively trace my origin back anywhere aside from the United States, but I
feel as though knowing where your ancestors came from does not make you anymore
a part of that culture. Finding out that my ancestors were from a particular
African country, say Nigeria would not suddenly make me Nigerian. Being
Nigerian means so much more than simply having a haplotype derived from that
region of the world. It is possible that knowing this ancestry might lead me to
explore more about Nigerian culture and spend time living in Nigeria and really
take in what it means to be Nigerian. Otherwise, it would feel like nothing
more than a façade, a nice “talking point” when introducing myself. I don’t
think that people should use these ancestries to find out more about
themselves. One SNP is only but a small piece of the whole puzzle of our existence.
Allyson's argument brought up a really interesting distinction to me about the difference between race and culture. For some people, learning that their relatives a few generations ago belonged to another culture that they do not belong to now, would be extremely significant. However, this significance stems from a cultural identity, not a racial one. Culture can change, but race cannot, which is why race can "trap" people into an identity that they do not identify with. Coming from a particular geographic area of the world is far less significant than learning about the cultural identity that your relatives had.
ReplyDeleteTo qualify these comments, there are also plenty of people who use their cultural identity right now to define themselves. Does geographical testing to find out where their ancestors came from matter? Through most of the article, it seems like the answer to that is no. At this point, it appears that the most important factor that creates someone's identity is how that person views their own cultural existence.