Epigenetics for the social sciences: justice, embodiment, and inheritance in the postgenomic age

Meloni, Maurizio

doi:10.1080/14636778.2015.1034850

Cited by 78 publications

(47 citation statements)

References 138 publications

(128 reference statements)

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“…But here we are presented with a porous and ecological figure of the human whose life course microbial exposures come to configure identity, subjectivity and health outcomes (cf. Meloni on epigenetics). Only some of our microbes are inherited and the microbial self is thus open to deliberate or inadvertent modification.…”

Section: Geography Dysbiosis and Global Healthmentioning

confidence: 99%

Parasites, ghosts and mutualists: a relational geography of microbes for global health

Lorimer

2017

Trans Inst British Geog

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Scientific research on the microbiome offers an ecological model of the human, comprised of myriad forms of microbial life. The composition and dynamics of this human microbiome are increasingly implicated in discussions of health. Attention has focused on missing microbes and their links to a range of inflammatory and autoimmune diseases. Pathological dysbiosis is understood to result from both the excessive presence and the absence of microbes. Microbial declines have been indexed to modern hygiene and healthcare practices and there is a growing interest in the therapeutic use of beneficial microbes. This reappraisal of the salutary potential of microbes challenges the negative associations prevalent in health geography and the field of global health. This paper develops relational and multispecies approaches to health geography to examine situations of microbial excess, absence and controlled reintroduction. The analysis focuses on human relations with hookworms. Hookworms are animal members of the microbiome. They co-evolved with humans, live in us and are understood to manage the human microbiome to enable immunological tolerance. Both the excessive presence and the absence of hookworms can be pathological. They are currently the subjects of concurrent, but spatially discrete, programmes to deworm and reworm a variegated world. Focusing on this seeming spatial paradox, the analysis examines three types of human-hookworm relation: the parasite, the ghost and the mutualist. The conclusion reflects on the implications of this analysis for the human and nonhuman subjects of global health and the microbiopolitics of prevalent forms of antibiotic and probiotic healthcare.

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Section: Geography Dysbiosis and Global Healthmentioning

confidence: 99%

Parasites, ghosts and mutualists: a relational geography of microbes for global health

Lorimer

2017

Trans Inst British Geog

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“…The conceptualizations underlying behavioral genetics have their roots in the biologically naïve 19th century writings of Francis Galton, and it is these conceptual underpinnings that stand to be undermined by new discoveries about epigenetics; because epigenetic phenomena are physical interactions, research findings about epigenetics should challenge the genetic determinism that is permitted by traditional behavioral genetics conceptualizations [Keller, 2014;Lester, Conradt, & Marsit, 2016;Meloni, 2015]. However, if epigenetic phenomena are merely incorporated into 19th century theoretical structures, their discovery could fail to spur conceptual change.…”

Section: The Potential Failure Of Epigenetics As a Dichotomy Breakermentioning

confidence: 99%

“…A look at the recent literature focusing specifically on behavioral epigenetics -the branch of epigenetics concerned with psychological phenomena such as stress reactivity, psychopathology, learning, and memory [Lester et al, 2011] -suggests that many theorists are optimistic that these new discoveries will produce a sea change in our conceptions. To provide just a few examples out of many that are available, Loi, Del Savio, & Stupka [2013] stated that "epigenetics provides a chain of connections between what used to be qualified as social and natural inequality, leading to a reformulation of these contested boundaries" (p. 143), and Meloni [2015] concurred that "epigenetics makes the inappropriateness of the natural/social divide … even more flagrant" (p. 133). Highlighting the potentially revolutionary implications of some epigenetic phenomena, Keller [2014] argued that work in this domain "challenges the very distinction between 'genetic' and 'non-genetic.'…”

Section: Nature/nurture: a Persistent Problemmentioning

confidence: 99%

The Potential of Epigenetics Research to Transform Conceptions of Phenotype Development

Moore¹

2017

Human Development

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Epigenetics remains an exciting subdiscipline of biology, generating discoveries and insights about development. Because epigenetic phenomena can draw attention to the dynamic, interactional, and probabilistic nature of phenotype development, epigenetics research could hasten the demise of both nature-nurture debates and reductionist, genetically determinist perspectives on phenotype development. However, new data alone will not inevitably transform conceptualizations of phenotype origins, because it remains possible to assimilate epigenetic phenomena into traditional conceptual frameworks; epigenetic discoveries could even strengthen biologically determinist conclusions if traditional conceptualizations are retained. Although epigenetics will not force conceptual transformation, epigenetics research encourages the dismissal of the nature-nurture dichotomy by emphasizing mechanisms underlying phenotype development, thereby fostering clearer conceptions of how phenotypes emerge from interactions between biological and nonbiological components of developing systems. The developmental systems perspective, which acknowledges the vital roles of contexts in development, offers benefits not provided by reductionist perspectives, making it an appropriate conceptual framework for developmental science.

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“…Put more simply, epigenetics refers to those mechanisms of gene regulation that do not involve changes in DNA sequence. The discipline therefore brings debates about soft inheritance back to the fore (Meloni 2015). If material and social factors seem massively engaged in producing aspects of our own biology, then social control may "Genetic Load": How the Architects of the Modern Synthesis Became Trapped in a Scientific Ideology Alexandra Soulier allow us to take charge of our own heredity.…”

Section: Conclusion: Past and Presentmentioning

confidence: 99%

“Genetic Load”

Soulier

2018

Transversal

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The term "genetic load" first emerged in a paper written in 1950 by the geneticist H. Muller. It is a mathematical model based on biological, social, political and ethical arguments describing the dramatic accumulation of disadvantageous mutations in human populations that will occur in modern societies if eugenic measures are not taken. The model describes how the combined actions of medical and social progress will supposedly impede natural selection and make genes of inferior quality likely to spread across populations -a process which in fine loads their progress. Genetic load is based on optimal fitness and emerges from a "typological view" of evolution. This model of evolution had previously, however, been invalidated by Robert Wright and Theodosius Dobzhansky who, as early as 1946, showed that polymorphism was the rule in natural populations. The blooming and persistence of the concept of genetic load, after its theoretical basis had already expired, are a historical puzzle. This persistence reveals the intricacy of science and policy-making in eugenic matters. The Canguilhemian concept of 'scientific ideology ' (1988) is used along with the concept of 'immutable mobile' (Latour 1986) and compared with the concept of 'co-production' (Jasanoff 1998), to provide complementary perspectives on this complex phenomenon.

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Epigenetics for the social sciences: justice, embodiment, and inheritance in the postgenomic age

Cited by 78 publications

References 138 publications

Parasites, ghosts and mutualists: a relational geography of microbes for global health

Parasites, ghosts and mutualists: a relational geography of microbes for global health

The Potential of Epigenetics Research to Transform Conceptions of Phenotype Development

“Genetic Load”

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