Genetics and Identity: Conceptual and Ethical Issues

Anders Nordgren

For the last twenty years the concepts of identity and identification have been subject to much interest in the humanities and social sciences. However, the implications of genetics for identity and identification have been largely neglected.

In one part of this project, I distinguish various conceptions of identity (as continuity over time, as basic kind of being, as unique set of properties, and as social role) and identification (as subjective experience of identity in various senses and as social ascription of identity in various senses), and investigate systematically genetic perspectives on each of these conceptions. I stress the importance of taking the genetic perspectives seriously but also their limitations. In particular, I pinpoint conceptual problems that arise when a genetic approach to identity is adopted.

In another part of the project I analyze the web-rhetoric of companies offering DNA testing online direct to consumer. In this rhetoric the appeal to identity plays an important role.

Publications:

Nordgren A, 2008. Genetics and Identity. Community Genetics, 11 (5), pp.252-266.

Nordgren A, Juengst E T, 2009. Can Genomics Tell Me Who I Am? Essentialistic Rhetoric in Direct-to-Consumer DNA Testing. New Genetics and Society, 28(2), pp. 157-172.

Nordgren A, 2010. The rhetoric appeal to identity on websites of companies offering non-health-related DNA testing. Identity in the Information Society 3, pp. 473-487.

Nordgren A, 2010. Personal Genomics: Consumer Genomics Companies and their Rhetoric. In: Tupasela A (ed.). Consumer Medicine. TemaNord 2010:530. Copenhagen: Nordic Council of Ministers, pp. 39-51.

Nordgren A, 2010. Är DNA-testning via internet en lönsam affär? I: Namli E, Sundman P, Wigorts Yngvesson S (red.). Etiska undersökningar: Om samhällsmoral, etisk teori och teologi. Acta Universitatis Upsaliensis. Uppsala Studies in Social Ethics 40. Uppsala University Library, sid. 227-244.

Nordgren A (advance publication online). Neither as harmful as feared by critics nor as empowering as promised by providers: Risk information offered direct to consumer by personal genomics companies. Journal of Community Genetics. DOI: 10.1007/s12687-012-0094-0.

Nordgren A (accepted). Consumer genomics companies and their appeal to empowerment. In: Derkx P, Kunneman H (eds). Genomics and Democracy: Towards a 'Lingua Democratica' for the Public Debate on Genomics. Amsterdam: Rodopi.

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