Written by: Christa Ventresca
Edited by: Christina Del Greco, Andres Rivera Ruiz, Kate Giffin, and Jennifer Baker
Illustrated by: Saaj Chattopadhyay
This is part three of a three-part blog series on genetic testing and its impacts on personal identity. Make sure to read parts one and two first!
As I’ve discussed in the last two blog posts, genetic testing is frequently seen as objective, and this view is promoted by genetic ancestry companies through their advertising (Parthasarathy, 2010). Yet when an ancestry test taker is incorporating genetic ancestry testing into their identity, most people see the results as flexible and reconfigure their identity through conversations with their community (Panofsky and Donovan, 2019; Marcon, Rachul, and Caulfield; 2021; and Nelson, 2008).
In contrast to this individual idea of malleable identity, ancestry tests are increasingly being incorporated into existing policies and shaping the ways we think about citizenship, ethnicity, and identity. The usage of genetic data in policy raises several concerns about the role of genetics in the history of eugenics – the idea that humans can be improved through selective breeding – and how the categorization of humans can turn deadly (NHGRI, 2022). These policies force a biological understanding of relationships, despite more people using social dynamics to define their family.
Genetic Analysis in Global Policies
Since genetics is associated with objectivity and policymakers want a simple, objective method to base decisions on, genetic analysis appears as an attractive option to policymakers for several issues. One example of this is immigration practices in Germany (Heinemann and Lemke, 2014). In Europe, the most common form of immigration is family unification. This is when one member of a family becomes established in one country and the other family members immigrate to join them. Policies in Germany require evidence that the individuals are related before they can allow this kind of immigration. There are many documents that can fulfill these requirements, but certain countries, usually African or Asian countries, are blacklisted for not having “rigorous” documentation practices (Heinemann and Lemke, 2014). As a result, most applicants from these countries must resort to DNA testing to prove relationships.
This narrows the definition of what a family can look like to the biological definition, which contrasts with what German citizens are allowed. In Germany, unmarried couples can adopt children and same-sex marriage has been legalized, along with other legislation that allows for an understanding of family based on social relationships rather than biological ones. The limitations of the biological understanding of family become clear in the case where individuals seeking to immigrate had DNA tests indicating that they were unrelated, yet employees performing the test were so convinced that the individuals were a family they wrote to the government insisting that they be reunited (Heinemann and Lemke, 2014). Unsurprisingly, it turns out that these policies – forms of which are used in places besides Germany, including the United States – are little more than a new way to enforce discrimination, undermining their claim to objectivity invoked by genetic testing.
Ancestry testing is also being used in policies surrounding indigeneity. Many countries have policies in place to support indigenous individuals, so the challenge becomes determining who is indigenous and who is not. This is primarily used by the United States federal government to determine who is eligible for certain kinds of support (Tallbear, 2013), but as a result indigenous leaders have to adopt these policies to determine who can be a citizen of a tribe. Genetic information therefore is seen as being able to “diagnose” indigeneity (Benjamin, 2015).
There are many issues with using genetic data in indigenous policy, including who is in control of this data and the decision-making. It is rarely in the hands of the indigenous individuals as the companies and policies are run by people who hold dominant identities, keeping the power from the individuals whose data it is (Kolopenuk, 2020). This framework can support colonialism as indigenous groups do not define relationships through biological means – instead, social relationships and lifestyle tend to take priority (Tallbear, 2013 and Kolopenuk, 2020). This imposes the modern understanding of genetics onto how tribes have historically claimed membership.
Throughout these policies related to immigration and indigeneity, we see biological definitions of relationships and family being imposed, even though they contradict with the popular, social understanding of relationships. Additionally, these tests make it easier to discriminate against marginalized groups with the help of scientific concepts to cement old prejudices.
The Legacy of Eugenics in Modern Genetics Studies
The field of genetics is still recovering from the legacy of eugenics and the way we conceive of race. Race is commonly seen as the main reason for human differences and it is tightly linked to discussions of human diversity (Tallbear, 2013). These ancestry tests in many ways represent a melding of old race ideas with modern research into human diversity (Benjamin, 2015). This is exemplified in the Human Genome Diversity Project, where scientists proposed studying “genetically isolated, pure and homogeneous groups” of populations that were subject to minimal admixture to explore human evolution and migration (Nash, 2014). The project was shut down due to criticism that it represented a kind of bio-colonialism of indigenous groups where the genetic data of specific groups were mined for the profit of others.
This legacy from the Human Genome Diversity Project has now been taken up by the Genographic Project, a team headed by the same people that also wants to track human migration and diversity. Despite a change in how the research is portrayed, their advertising materials contain images such as children with a range of skin tones, tying their findings to the modern understanding of race that is closely linked to skin color (Nash, 2014). Their use of terms like “population differences and diversity” continue to racialize science and understandings of genetics.
One possible solution to this is to shift how genetics is publicly portrayed and emphasize the limitations of genetics from the beginning (Benjamin, 2015). Instead of promoting genetics’ objectivity, focusing on the limitations of genetics from the start would restrict the over-interpretation of results. One example of this could be requiring genetic ancestry tests to make their methods more transparent and available to consumers and change their language to be much less definitive. If genetics and objectivity become decoupled, then genetics can be much more effectively divorced from the idea of race. As a result, policymakers will have a harder time using genetic testing in procedures that can further exclusionary practices. This shift towards partiality will change how science is understood by the public, but it will help minimize instances of objective policy contradicting popular understanding of identity.
Conclusions
Genealogy genetics is a relatively new field of study that promises objectivity through the classification of individuals, primarily through ancestry testing. The results of these tests can have a large impact on the construction of identity, but this is filtered through conversations with the pre-existing communities a person belongs to. As a result, identity is highly malleable and does not follow the projected objectivity of genetics. Increasingly, these tests are being used in immigration and indigenous policies, contradicting how individuals conceive of identity and emphasizing the supposed objectivity of genetics.
To try and rectify this course, we need to embrace partiality and the limits of genetic analysis. This will help to line up understandings of identity with policy and promote a less objective understanding of genetics that will lead to less codified discrimination. Genetic testing continues to have more and more of an impact on our lives. It is time to reevaluate the consequences of how it has been portrayed.
Christa Ventresca (she/they) is a fifth year PhD student in the Genetics and Genomics program at UMich while also getting a Master’s in Bioinformatics and a certificate in Science, Technology, and Society (STS). This is their first time writing for MiSciWriters!
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