Body and Soul


Book Description

Alondra Nelson recovers a lesser-known aspect of The Black Panther Party's broader struggle for social justice: health care. Nelson argues that the Party's focus on health care was practical and ideological and that their understanding of health as a basic human right and its engagement with the social implications of genetics anticipated current debates about the politics of health and race.




The Social Life of DNA


Book Description

The unexpected story of how genetic testing is affecting race in America We know DNA is a master key that unlocks medical and forensic secrets, but its genealogical life is both revelatory and endlessly fascinating. Tracing genealogy is now the second-most popular hobby amongst Americans, as well as the second-most visited online category. This billion-dollar industry has spawned popular television shows, websites, and Internet communities, and a booming heritage tourism circuit. The tsunami of interest in genetic ancestry tracing from the African American community has been especially overwhelming. In The Social Life of DNA, Alondra Nelson takes us on an unprecedented journey into how the double helix has wound its way into the heart of the most urgent contemporary social issues around race. For over a decade, Nelson has deeply studied this phenomenon. Artfully weaving together keenly observed interactions with root-seekers alongside illuminating historical details and revealing personal narrative, she shows that genetic genealogy is a new tool for addressing old and enduring issues. In The Social Life of DNA, she explains how these cutting-edge DNA-based techniques are being used in myriad ways, including grappling with the unfinished business of slavery: to foster reconciliation, to establish ties with African ancestral homelands, to rethink and sometimes alter citizenship, and to make legal claims for slavery reparations specifically based on ancestry. Nelson incisively shows that DNA is a portal to the past that yields insight for the present and future, shining a light on social traumas and historical injustices that still resonate today. Science can be a crucial ally to activism to spur social change and transform twenty-first-century racial politics. But Nelson warns her readers to be discerning: for the social repair we seek can't be found in even the most sophisticated science. Engrossing and highly original, The Social Life of DNA is a must-read for anyone interested in race, science, history and how our reckoning with the past may help us to chart a more just course for tomorrow.




Happy Birthday Una - The Big Birthday Activity Book


Book Description

Happy Birthday Una is a personalized kids activity book, it includes personalized crosswords, word searches, number puzzles, jokes, drawing and coloring >It is suitable for children between 6-11 years old It is the perfect birthday present for Una, and is a great keepsake for parents to remember their child's early years and birthdays This personalized book is available for other names also This is a great gift for children and an amazing keepsake for parents Happy Birthday Una




Genetics and the Unsettled Past


Book Description

Our genetic markers have come to be regarded as portals to the past. Analysis of these markers is increasingly used to tell the story of human migration; to investigate and judge issues of social membership and kinship; to rewrite history and collective memory; to right past wrongs and to arbitrate legal claims and human rights controversies; and to open new thinking about health and well-being. At the same time, in many societies genetic evidence is being called upon to perform a kind of racially charged cultural work: to repair the racial past and to transform scholarly and popular opinion about the “nature” of identity in the present. Genetics and the Unsettled Past considers the alignment of genetic science with commercial genealogy, with legal and forensic developments, and with pharmaceutical innovation to examine how these trends lend renewed authority to biological understandings of race and history. This unique collection brings together scholars from a wide range of disciplines—biology, history, cultural studies, law, medicine, anthropology, ethnic studies, sociology—to explore the emerging and often contested connections among race, DNA, and history. Written for a general audience, the book’s essays touch upon a variety of topics, including the rise and implications of DNA in genealogy, law, and other fields; the cultural and political uses and misuses of genetic information; the way in which DNA testing is reshaping understandings of group identity for French Canadians, Native Americans, South Africans, and many others within and across cultural and national boundaries; and the sweeping implications of genetics for society today.




Technicolor


Book Description

The cultural impact of new information and communication technologies has been a constant topic of debate, but questions of race and ethnicity remain a critical absence. TechniColor fills this gap by exploring the relationship between race and technology.From Indian H-1B Workers and Detroit techno music to karaoke and the Chicano interneta, TechniColor's specific case studies document the ways in which people of color actually use technology. The results rupture such racial stereotypes as Asian whiz-kids and Black and Latino techno-phobes, while fundamentally challenging many widely-held theoretical and political assumptions. Incorporating a broader definition of technology and technological practices--to include not only those technologies thought to create "revolutions" (computer hardware and software) but also cars, cellular phones, and other everyday technologies--TechniColor reflects the larger history of technology use by people of color. Contributors: Vivek Bald, Ben Chappell, Beth Coleman, McLean Greaves, Logan Hill, Alicia Headlam Hines, Karen Hossfeld, Amitava Kumar, Casey Man Kong Lum, Alondra Nelson, Mimi Nguyen, Guillermo Goméz-Peña, Tricia Rose, Andrew Ross, Thuy Linh Nguyen Tu, and Ben Williams.




Surrendering to the Call


Book Description

This quick and easy-to-read book of humorous vignettes, taken from the author's daily life, provides readers with profound yet practical strategies to personally explore everyday occurrences. Readers are coached to step into their own authenticity, while embracing ambiguity and a sense of the unknown. Building on the book Rushing to Yoga, this book delves into a deeper level of self-exploration and personal insight. It is a must-read for anyone who is questioning their own sense of purpose.




With Clipped Wings


Book Description

Poetry.




Herencia


Book Description

A major anthology of Hispanic writing in the U.S., ranging from the early Spanish explorers to the present day.




Science in Black and White


Book Description

This unflinching expose of racially biased research--the Alt-Right's "scientific wing"--debunks both old and emerging claims of inborn racial disparities.Racial groups differ in some of their social patterns, but the cause of those differences--nature versus nurture, or genetics versus environment-- remains fiercely debated. For the pro-nature camp-- sometimes aligned with white nationalism and eugenics, and often used to promote ideas of racial inferiority and superiority -- race-based biological determinism contributes significantly to the ethnic divide, especially the black/white gap in societal achievement. By contrast, pro-nurture supporters attribute ethnic variation in social outcomes primarily to environmental circumstances, ecological conditions, and personal experience. In this thoroughly researched book, science writer Alondra Oubre examines emerging scientific discoveries that show how both biology and environment interact to influence IQ--intelligence performance--and social behaviors across continental populations, or human races. She presents compelling evidence for why environmental and certain non-DNA-related biological phenomena overall seem to best explain black/white disparities in a gamut of social behaviors, including family structure, parenting, educational attainment, and rates of violent crime. As she demonstrates, nature still matters, but the biology that impacts racial variance in social behaviors extends beyond genetics to include other processes--epigenetics, gene expression, and plasticity--all of which are profoundly affected by a wide array of environmental forces. The complex, synergistic interplay of these factors combined, rather than just genes or just environment, appears to account for black/white divergence in a gamut of social behaviors.




Afrofuturism


Book Description

Challenging mainstream technocultural assumptions of a raceless future, Afrofuturism explores culturally distinct approaches to technology. This special issue addresses the intersection between African diasporic culture and technology through literature, poetry, science fiction and speculative fiction, music, visual art, and the Internet and maintains that racial identity fundamentally influences technocultural practices. The collection includes a reflection on the ideologies of race created by cultural critics in their analyses of change wrought by the information age; an interview with Nalo Hopkinson, the award-winning novelist and author of speculative fiction novels Midnight Robber and Brown Girl in the Ring, who fuses futuristic thinking with Caribbean traditions; an essay on how contemporary R&B music presents African American reflections on the technologies of everyday life; and an article examining early interventions by the black community to carve out a distinct niche in cyberspace. Contributors. Ron Eglash, Anna Everett, Tana Hargest, Nalo Hopkinson, Tracie Morris, Alondra Nelson, Kalí Tal, Fatimah Tuggar, Alexander G. Weheliye Alondra Nelson is a Ph.D. candidate in the American Studies Program at New York University and is the Ann Plato Fellow at Trinity College. She will begin teaching in the African American Studies and Sociology Departments at Yale University in the fall of 2002. Contributors. Ron Eglash, Anna Everett, Tana Hargest, Nalo Hopkinson, Alondra Nelson, Tracie Morris, Kali Tal, Fatimah Tuggar, Alexander G. Weheliye