Recent developments in genetics have afforded a language and a means of reconceptualising the origins and nature of social identity. It is argued that European society is undergoing a process of geneticisation, whereby genetic explanation is increasingly used to define significant social identities and relationships of, for example, gender, kinship, race, sexuality and nationality. Yet we know very little empirically about the way in which different European cultures make sense of the new genetics and its implications. This project aims to investigate the way in which a range of cultures, positioned differently vis a vis genetics (as experts, lay people, professionals, patients etc.) and located differently in terms of location, understand the 'new genetics' and its social and cultural implications. A series of specific case studies will be augmented by historical analysis and grounded in national legislative frameworks.

The contribution of the Lithuanian team will be an ethnographic study "Local understanding of ethnicity, family and kinship". The aim of this project is to investigate the way in which the different social groups of Lithuanian society understand the new genetic technologies in relation to ethnicity, family and kinship. The project is based on the premise that popular understandings of new genetics includes scientific information and is capable of evaluating the technology and it's practical applications. It can be expected that this project of intercultural research will assist in forming a multifaceted view of social and cultural aspects of scientific and technological innovations. It is particularly significant in the case of Lithuania, where the traditions of a social study of various aspects of life have not yet been firmly established.

Consortium


Project co-ordinator:
Department of Social Anthropology of the Victoria University of Manchester, United Kingdom.