ANT102H5 Lecture Notes - Lecture 3: Human Genome Project, Sociocultural Anthropology, Essentialism
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ANT102H5 Full Course Notes
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General notes: the claims of identity and claims of social connections rely often on the idea of an essentialized self. Ideas of essentialism are all around us through a range of popular sources (social media, mainstream media / science). We often resort to essentialism: sociocultural anthropology relies on the nurture side of the nature vs nurture debate. On essentialism, which should be challenged (cid:894)esse(cid:374)tialis(cid:373) ai(cid:374)"t true(cid:895): essentialism: there is something essential within us (an inner core), inborn / natural, unchangeable, and defines our identity. It determines what we share or hide from others: example: being born a black female; you cannot alter being born black, born female, etc. It connects your experiences with other black females: biological reductionism / biological essentialism / genetic essentialism: an essence within us to be discovered; it defines who we are. Related to biological esse(cid:374)tialis(cid:373) is ge(cid:374)eti(cid:272) esse(cid:374)tialis(cid:373), (cid:449)here (cid:862)our fate is (cid:449)ithi(cid:374) our ge(cid:374)es(cid:863) (cid:894)watso(cid:374)(cid:895).