Who gets the last laugh, again?Posted in Anthropology, Articles, Health/Medicine/Genetics, Media Archive, Social Science, United States on 2013-11-26 18:32Z by Steven |
Who gets the last laugh, again?
Africa is a Country
2013-11-18
Jessica Blatt, Assistant Professor of Political Science
Marymount Manhattan College, New York, New York
I enjoy seeing a smug, bearded white supremacist get his comeuppance as much as the next guy. (Though the joy of the exuberant lady sitting next to this one is hard to match. And reason enough to watch this video more than once.) In any event, I get why this video of Craig Cobb, the would-be founder of an all-white town in North Dakota, finding out on a TV show that a DNA test indicates that he is “14% sub-Saharan African” has gone viral.
At the same time, the talk-showification of molecular biology is really never a good thing, especially when that molecular biology is supposed to tell us things about “race.” (And let’s face it, “race” is pretty much the only way molecular biologists get any pop-culture shine.) Problem is, the idea that Cobb is 14% African rests on the assumption that there is such a thing as 100% “African,” or 100% “European.”…
Read the entire article here.