With the emergence and popularity of at-home DNA testing, scientific methods and findings are essentially used to further cement the notion of race as biologically determined. Services that provide DNA testing such as Ancestry.com have promised individuals the opportunity to trace their genetic heritage and to make their identities whole. Oftentimes, these services use advertisements that showcase heartwarming reunions, cultural connections, and a sense of belonging, which they deem are possible through the analysis of DNA. However, advertisements such as the one shown below, perpetuate the cultural authority of science by reducing a person’s identity to their genetic compositions, operating based on genetic information filtered through scientific racism, and perpetuating the biological determinist model of race.
As seen through the advert, Ancestry.com posits the discovery of one’s genetic heritage as finding “what makes you, you”. This statement implies that Ancestry.com (and the concept of DNA testing for race as a whole) operates on the belief that a person’s identity is determined by their genetic composition.
We’ve seen this through the justification that women are biologically inferior on the basis of having less physical strength or being too emotional, which then operated to legitimize their subordination in Western society. This applies to the notion of race, which was supported by science at the time and, as we can see here, even now.
Rather than highlighting how race has been socially constructed to serve colonial purposes (i.e., to subjugate, annihilate, and terrorize people based on the colour of their skin in order to gain territory, resources, and power), services like Ancestry.com allow the usage of science to support the biological determination of race and the concept of race as involving distinguishing races between physical differences instead of involving the social meanings provided to these differences.
Furthermore, Ancestry.com fails to address how scientific information, especially in terms of genomics, has largely been produced within a racist (among other types of oppression) framework (Cooper 2013). Historically, science has focused on essentializing races, or on attributing certain traits and personalities to one’s race. As such, science then served to collect and interpret data based on the racial hierarchies present at the time; this extends to the collection of DNA samples.
According to AncestryDNA, DNA testing uses a saliva sample to compare the “700,000 [DNA] markers” with “population data from more than 2,600 global regions” (Ancestry). This, then, shows how science has had – and still does – a cultural authority by defining race in terms of genetic variance. It has been disproved numerous times, however, that race has no genetic basis, such as the findings of the Human Genome Project in 2003 (Duello 2021). Thus, by the historical labelling and interpreting of DNA based on race, DNA-testing services operate based on samples that have already been produced through racial biases.
As such, services like Ancestry.com position science as having cultural authority since they promote the ideology of race as anything but a social construct, tie an individual’s identity to their biologically determined and arbitrary features, and contend that there are tangible divisions between people based on physical differences. While at-home DNA testing can provide glimpses into one’s genetic ancestry, it reduces identity to genetic markers, perpetuates biological determinism, and operates using racialized scientific methods and analyses.
References
Ancestry. (n.d.). About AncestryDNA®. https://support.ancestry.com/s/article/About-AncestryDNA?language=en_US#:~:text=AncestryDNA%20uses%20microarray%2Dbased%20autosomal,DNA%20inherited%20from%20autosomal%20chromosomes
Cooper, R.S. (2013). Race in biological and biomedical research. Cold Spring Harbor Perspectives in Medicine, 3(11), 1-10. https://doi.org/10.1101%2Fcshperspect.a008573
Duello, T.M., Rivedal, S., Wickland, C., & Weller, A. (2021). Race and genetics versus ‘race’ in genetics. Evolution, Medicine, & Public Health, 9(1), 232-245. https://doi.org/10.1093%2Femph%2Feoab018
Image and Video Attributions (In Order of Appearance)
https://scijust.ucsc.edu/2019/05/30/developing-debate-on-race-and-genomics/
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scientific_racism
https://support.ancestry.com/s/article/What-to-Expect-from-AncestryDNA?language=en_US