Ordinary Genomes: Science, Citizenship, and Genetic Identities available in Paperback, eBook
Ordinary Genomes: Science, Citizenship, and Genetic Identities
- ISBN-10:
- 082234534X
- ISBN-13:
- 9780822345343
- Pub. Date:
- 09/23/2009
- Publisher:
- Duke University Press
- ISBN-10:
- 082234534X
- ISBN-13:
- 9780822345343
- Pub. Date:
- 09/23/2009
- Publisher:
- Duke University Press
Ordinary Genomes: Science, Citizenship, and Genetic Identities
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Product Details
| ISBN-13: | 9780822345343 |
|---|---|
| Publisher: | Duke University Press |
| Publication date: | 09/23/2009 |
| Series: | Experimental Futures Series |
| Pages: | 262 |
| Product dimensions: | 6.10(w) x 9.10(h) x 0.70(d) |
About the Author
Karen-Sue Taussig is Associate Professor of Anthropology at the University of Minnesota.
Read an Excerpt
ORDINARY GENOMES
Science, Citizenship, and Genetic IdentitiesBy KAREN-SUE TAUSSIG
Duke University Press
Copyright © 2009 Duke University PressAll right reserved.
ISBN: 978-0-8223-4516-9
Chapter One
"GOD MADE THE WORLD AND THE DUTCH MADE HOLLAND"
In Europe we are not so concerned with one's work.... You know for us the character of a person matters more. -quoted in Scott Haas, Are We There Yet?
An elaboration of some aspects of Dutch history and social life will contextualize my analysis of practices and beliefs surrounding genetics in the Netherlands. Three major themes frame this analysis. The first involves how Dutch society in general deals with difference through social structures that accommodate it and social values that tolerate it. I approach the question of difference historically by examining the Dutch tradition of bounding religious difference in institutional structures that render it less threatening. How Dutch society deals with difference in general directly shapes how Dutch people both inside and outside the clinic construe and manage genetic differences in particular. The second theme involves considering how a constraining aspect of Dutch tolerance produces a powerful dynamic of normalization. Together with their attitudes of tolerance, Dutch people simultaneously emphasize the importance of fitting in by being ordinary or typical. The third theme speaks to how the legacy of the Second World War affects contemporary attitudes toward both difference and genetics. Many Dutch people strongly feel the need to define their society against Nazi intolerance toward difference as manifested in the Nazi program of racial hygiene. This elaboration of Dutch social life analyzes quotidian knowledge to illustrate how cultural values often thought to be so obvious as not to warrant examination in fact demand the closest anthropological attention in order to show their generative force.
The title of this chapter is a Dutch saying. It refers to the fact that much of the territory of the Netherlands is made up of land reclaimed, through human effort, from the ocean. The Dutch literally made the provinces of Holland as well as parts of the other provinces making up the Kingdom of the Netherlands, much of which is below sea level. I use the title here to stress that the Dutch, like any society, also make their social world.
TOLERANCE AND THE MANAGEMENT OF DIFFERENCE
A central aspect of contemporary Dutch identity involves the idea that Dutch people are self-consciously tolerant. Dutch tolerance grows out of a history of religious diversity and is supported by social structures that help manage difference at a societal level. I begin with a discussion of the Oscar-winning Dutch film Antonia's Line. The film uses Antonia's story as a celebration of a widespread ideal of modern Dutch personhood as tolerant, secular, and antifascist. I then elaborate on aspects of Dutch social life that contextualize the ways Dutch people interpret and deal with difference. These include the Dutch history of religious pluralism, its institutionalization in the structure of what Dutch scholars describe as verzuiling and translate as "pillarization" (referring to the idea that Dutch society stands on several distinct "pillars" or social groups), and the more recent process of secularization. This analysis reveals that contemporary Dutch identities are deeply informed by the ideal of tolerance.
Antonia's Line
In 1996 the Dutch movie Antonia's Line won the American Oscar award for best foreign film. Although the film received mixed reviews in both the Netherlands and the United States, it is significant as a celebration of important aspects of contemporary Dutch social life. The film valorizes the daily enactment of a Dutch social ideal of tolerance. It also emphasizes the importance of ordinary middle-class life, the persistent significance of the Second World War, and the secular nature of life in the Netherlands today.
Like any text, a film can be read in numerous ways. Antonia's Line centers on the lives of four generations of one family. It is, perhaps primarily, a feminist film about strong, outspoken, self-sufficient women. This feminist story is one of autonomy from men. Against the backdrop of this theme the film also presents an account of broad changes in social life since the end of the Second World War that resonates resoundingly with contemporary understandings of the recent past and with key aspects of contemporary Dutch identity.
The film opens and closes on the day of Antonia's death. In between it reviews Antonia's life from the end of the war, when she returns to her ailing mother's farm in her natal village with her own daughter, Danielle. In opening with explicit reference to the end of the war, the film indexes a key moment in Dutch history. It marks the beginning not only of Antonia's story but also of a new era in modern Dutch life. One might say that Antonia's story is an idealized story of the contemporary Netherlands.
The mother soon dies, and Antonia and Danielle, apparently the only surviving family members, settle into running the family farm and into a variety of relationships with people in the village. As a woman and single mother farming her land on her own, Antonia is a bit of an oddity in the Netherlands of the 1940s. Her status as both a landowner and native to the village means she is deserving of acceptance from other villagers, no matter how grudging that tolerance might be. It is clear from the beginning of the film that other villagers view Antonia as not appropriately conforming to the norms of village life. Yet, she is also undeniably a native who belongs there.
The primary members of Antonia's social circle are all decidedly out of the ordinary. They include
- the village idiot, who loyally follows Antonia after she chastises a group of young children who were taunting and throwing rocks at him;
- Deedee, the developmentally disabled daughter of the local wealthy family, whom Danielle brings to live with Antonia after finding her being raped by one of her two brothers;
- Farmer Bas, a widower, and his three sons, who do not have good relationships with most village residents because, having lived in the village for only twenty years, they are considered outsiders;
- Olga, a Russian émigré who runs the village cafe/pub;
- "Crooked Finger" or "Finger," an eccentric intellectual who is an old friend of Antonia's. Along with some of Antonia's other village friends, Finger was active in the Resistance during the Nazi occupation. He now never leaves his home.
Each of these characters represents a specific type of difference illustrative of popular ideas about the problematic nature of village life before the war and of the negative side of Dutch social life. The village idiot is a social problem; Deedee's mental retardation is a genetic problem. Farmer Bas and Olga, as outsiders, represent a geographical problem, in particular the problem of immigration. Finger is a problem because his principled behavior during the war stands as a reminder of other villagers' acceptance and possible complicity with fascist authority. Each of the characters is a problem because each stands out as individually distinctive from the norm.
Nevertheless, the film portrays the characters in Antonia's circle in a positive light as colorful and of value. The film depicts the bulk of the village population, in contrast, as boorish, colorless, and backward. The film draws its negative portrayal of the mainstream villagers by highlighting their distance from Antonia and their intolerance of perceived outsiders. It also focuses on their apparently blind and hypocritical religious devotion and raises questions surrounding their potential complicity with the Nazis. Taken together, these images serve to represent the villagers as outside the contemporary Dutch ethos of secular, tolerant, antifascism as represented by Antonia. Antonia's circle is also distinguished from the local wealthy family, which is marked by the domineering presence of men and the greed and excess associated with wealth and unchecked power.
The film celebrates Antonia's generous tolerance by showing how it enriches her life and the lives of those around her. It contrasts Antonia's colorful life full of family and friends with the drab lives of the mainstream villagers and the bitter lives of the local elite. The viewer sees Antonia leading a happy and fulfilling life surrounded by people whom she knows and cares about and who know and care about her. Tolerance in the form enacted by Antonia, which involves acceptance, caring, and understanding, reflects widespread attitudes about what tolerance in its ideal form involves in the Netherlands today. Antonia's moral strength is further demonstrated in her outspoken criticism of the local priest and other villagers for their intolerance of outsiders, the hypocrisy of their religious practices, and their complicity with the Nazis during the war.
As the years pass, the circle around Antonia and Danielle expands. Nevertheless, those making up the circle continue to be marked by their difference from the traditional rural Dutch population. In contrast to the earlier members of Antonia's circle, who represented the problem of conventional Dutch (especially village) life, the new characters represent differences associated with modernity. These differences include sexual orientation, increased opportunity and autonomy for women, single parenthood, and secularization.
The film highlights the rapid secularization process in the Netherlands since the 1960s through a series of changes in village life. As time passes, fewer and fewer villagers are active in the church, while those who are die. One priest leaves the church because he finds it too repressive and therefore stifling of who he really is as a (Dutch) person. He becomes part of Antonia's social circle and eventually marries the single mother of two who has also joined Antonia's circle. Meanwhile, a Protestant man and Catholic woman who had been prevented from marrying across religious lines die futilely of broken hearts.
The film represents Dutch attitudes about the problems of wealth by contrasting Antonia's richly fulfilling middle-class life and values to the selfishness and cruelty exhibited by the family of wealth. Deedee finds a haven at Antonia's farm, where she happily marries the sweet village idiot. Meanwhile, her family destroys itself through its greed and excess. One of Deedee's brothers leaves the village after raping her and joins the military. He returns years later upon his father's death only to collect his inheritance. While in the village he again commits a rape, this time of Antonia's preadolescent granddaughter. In perhaps the ultimate test of her tolerance, Antonia, when offered an opportunity for revenge, spares his life. He is left to meet his fate at the hands of his equally cruel brother, who kills him to secure a larger share of their inheritance.
The film also appears to recognize the persistence of some of the most extreme aspects of the conservatism of past social life. One could, for example, read Farmer Bas as a symbol of contemporary foreigners in the Netherlands-newcomers who are not well integrated or well accepted. The movie delivers the message that a good Dutch person such as Antonia is tolerant of newcomers. In other words, Antonia represents the ideal modern, enlightened Dutch person who lives a largely secular middle-class life, speaks up about injustice and hypocrisy, and is tolerant and accepting of those who are different from her or who are outsiders.
Ultimately, Antonia's Line celebrates the value of living a secular, middleclass, modern life informed by morally appropriate acceptance, understanding, and tolerance of difference. This version of tolerance is one that recognizes difference without rendering it hierarchical. During my fieldwork in the Netherlands I found these values manifest in an emphasis on recognizing shared humanity in spite of difference. This attitude is most clearly reflected in the way Dutch people appear to think of all people as the same but different.
The Same But Different
The theme of tolerance and conceptualizations of all people as the same but different persistently emerged in a wide range of settings during my fieldwork. Understanding how Dutch people manage difference is essential to understanding the ways genetic differences are handled socially, scientifically, and medically in the Dutch context. Dutch values about tolerance and associated understandings of similarity and difference are defining features of Dutch identity, constantly being produced and reproduced in daily life. They shape the ways Dutch people I met both inside and outside of clinical settings conceptualize Dutch identity and interpret and react to difference, including differences associated with genetic disease and abnormality. Recognition of the significance of pluralism and understandings of tolerance in the Dutch context are so pervasive that those studying the Netherlands almost inevitably point to them as crucial features of Dutch social life.
Scholars who study the Netherlands recognize the long existence of religious diversity and tolerance dating back to the Reformation. The long history of religious tolerance and heterogeneity in the Netherlands resonates with contemporary values, central to Dutch identity, which produce and maintain social norms while tolerating difference. Dutch tolerance since the Reformation is striking in comparison with the religious oppression of other European countries over the same period. Indeed, religious diversity in the Netherlands was to some extent the direct result of the immigration of religious groups such as the Flemings, Huguenots, and Jews who were fleeing persecution in their countries of origin. A number of authors have discussed the presence of religious tolerance and the social forces that supported it in detail for the Dutch Golden Age (Gouden Eeuw), the period in the seventeenth century during which the Netherlands became a global power, trading in spices and diamonds. The Dutch sociologist Johan Goudsblom remarks that Dutch merchants' "commercial interests were better served by peace and tolerance than by theological zealotry." He goes on to argue that these concerns moderated the influence of Calvinism and "created a social climate favorable to freedom of thought, for which the Dutch Republic was famous throughout the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries." As a result, he argues, "Dutch society, besides offering sanctuary to many foreign refugees, could preserve a varied religious composition among its native population" (Goudsblom 1967:18; see also, e.g., Schama 1988:61-62, and van Deursen 1991:233).
Religious Heterogeneity in the Netherlands Today
Tolerance of social difference in the Netherlands is rooted in the country's history of tolerance, understanding, and acceptance of religious pluralism -attitudes that have been institutionalized in the Netherlands since the mid-eighteenth century in the structure of verzuiling.
The Dutch sociologist J. P. Kruijt points out that "it is no accident that the only language which has a name for ... a [social] bloc is the Dutch language. In our country we call such a bloc a zuil.... The word pillar is a rather apt metaphor." He explains that
a pillar ... is a thing apart, resting on its own base (in our case a particular religious or non-religious faith) separated from other pillars ... they are standing upright, perpendicular sets of persons and groups separated from other sets. Perpendicular means that each pillar is cutting vertically the horizontal socio-economic strata which we call social classes. For a pillar is not a social class; it contains persons out of every social class or stratification. We might say that the "horizontal functional integration" is crossed by the "vertical ideological integration." Further, a pillar is solid; the ideological pillars of the Dutch nation are indeed strong super-organizations.... Finally, all the pillars together generally serve as a support to something resting on top; in our case, that something is the whole Dutch nation. At least, that is what is signified by this word pillar. (Kruijt 1974:129-30)
(Continues...)
Excerpted from ORDINARY GENOMES by KAREN-SUE TAUSSIG Copyright © 2009 by Duke University Press. Excerpted by permission.
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Table of Contents
Acknowledgments ixIntroduction. Science, Subjectivity, and Citizenship 1
1. "God Made the World and the Dutch Made Holland" 17
2. Genetics and the Organization of Genetic Practice in the Netherlands 57
3. The Social and Clinical Production of Ordinariness 85
4. Backward and Beautiful: Calvinism, Chromosomes, and the Production of Genetic Knowledge 135
5. Bovine Abominations: Contesting Genetic Technologies 159
Epilogue. Ordinary Genomes in a Globalizing World 189
Notes 201
Bibliography 217
Index 235