IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/sae/anname/v661y2015i1p143-159.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

The Biobank as Political Artifact

Author

Listed:
  • Sandra Soo-Jin Lee

Abstract

This article discusses the institutional practices of classifying and creating taxonomies of difference within biobanks (repositories that store a broad range of biological materials, including DNA) and the technical and sociopolitical priorities that ultimately create biobanks. I argue that biobanks operate as political artifacts and that the social circumstances surrounding the development and use of biobanks determine what counts as meaningful difference within human genetic research. The massive collection of human DNA, blood, and tissues is critical to genomic medicine and the development and governance of biobanks structure knowledge that will ultimately bear on how population differences are interpreted and health disparities are framed. Careful consideration of how to avoid the conflation of concepts of race, ethnicity, and nationality with biological differences is necessary to identify effective interventions that will bear positively on health.

Suggested Citation

  • Sandra Soo-Jin Lee, 2015. "The Biobank as Political Artifact," The ANNALS of the American Academy of Political and Social Science, , vol. 661(1), pages 143-159, September.
    • Handle: RePEc:sae:anname:v:661:y:2015:i:1:p:143-159
    DOI: 10.1177/0002716215591141
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/0002716215591141
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1177/0002716215591141?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Krieger, Nancy & Smith, Kevin & Naishadham, Deepa & Hartman, Cathy & Barbeau, Elizabeth M., 2005. "Experiences of discrimination: Validity and reliability of a self-report measure for population health research on racism and health," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 61(7), pages 1576-1596, October.
    2. Rex Dalton, 2004. "When two tribes go to war," Nature, Nature, vol. 430(6999), pages 500-502, July.
    3. Gamble, V.N., 1997. "Under the Shadow of Tuskegee: African Americans and Health Care," American Journal of Public Health, American Public Health Association, vol. 87(11), pages 1773-1778.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Fabian T C Schmidt & Clemens M Lechner & Daniel Danner, 2020. "New wine in an old bottle? A facet-level perspective on the added value of Grit over BFI–2 Conscientiousness," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 15(2), pages 1-25, February.
    2. Alfonso Urzúa & Alejandra Caqueo-Urízar & Diego Henríquez & David R. Williams, 2021. "Discrimination and Health: The Mediating Effect of Acculturative Stress," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 18(10), pages 1-11, May.
    3. Johnston, David W. & Lordan, Grace, 2012. "Discrimination makes me sick! An examination of the discrimination–health relationship," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 31(1), pages 99-111.
    4. Andrea D. Gurmankin & Jonathan Baron & Katrina Armstrong, 2004. "The Effect of Numerical Statements of Risk on Trust and Comfort with Hypothetical Physician Risk Communication," Medical Decision Making, , vol. 24(3), pages 265-271, June.
    5. Correa-Velez, Ignacio & Gifford, Sandra M. & Barnett, Adrian G., 2010. "Longing to belong: Social inclusion and wellbeing among youth with refugee backgrounds in the first three years in Melbourne, Australia," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 71(8), pages 1399-1408, October.
    6. Amelia S Knopf & Peter Krombach & Amy J Katz & Rebecca Baker & Gregory Zimet, 2021. "Measuring research mistrust in adolescents and adults: Validity and reliability of an adapted version of the Group-Based Medical Mistrust Scale," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 16(1), pages 1-9, January.
    7. Lynn N. Ibekwe & Maria Eugenia Fernández-Esquer & Sandi L. Pruitt & Nalini Ranjit & Maria E. Fernández, 2021. "Racism and Cancer Screening among Low-Income, African American Women: A Multilevel, Longitudinal Analysis of 2-1-1 Texas Callers," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 18(21), pages 1-19, October.
    8. Deepak Sartaj & Vijay Krishnan & Ravindra Rao & Atul Ambekar & Neeraj Dhingra & Pratap Sharan, 2021. "Mental illnesses and related vulnerabilities in the Hijra community: A cross-sectional study from India," International Journal of Social Psychiatry, , vol. 67(3), pages 290-297, May.
    9. Shippee, Tetyana Pylypiv & Schafer, Markus H. & Ferraro, Kenneth F., 2012. "Beyond the barriers: Racial discrimination and use of complementary and alternative medicine among Black Americans," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 74(8), pages 1155-1162.
    10. Allen, Jennifer D. & Kennedy, Mark & Wilson-Glover, Athene & Gilligan, Timothy D., 2007. "African-American men's perceptions about prostate cancer: Implications for designing educational interventions," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 64(11), pages 2189-2200, June.
    11. Marcelle M. Dougan & Marian Tzuang & Bora Nam & Oanh L. Meyer & Janice Y. Tsoh & Van M. Ta Park, 2024. "Discrimination Experiences among Asian American and Pacific Islander Adults during the COVID-19 Pandemic and Their Association with Mental Health Outcomes: Updated Findings from the COMPASS Study," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 21(6), pages 1-16, June.
    12. Nancy Krieger & Pamela D Waterman & Anna Kosheleva & Jarvis T Chen & Dana R Carney & Kevin W Smith & Gary G Bennett & David R Williams & Elmer Freeman & Beverley Russell & Gisele Thornhill & Kristin M, 2011. "Exposing Racial Discrimination: Implicit & Explicit Measures–The My Body, My Story Study of 1005 US-Born Black & White Community Health Center Members," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 6(11), pages 1-24, November.
    13. Shoff, Carla & Yang, Tse-Chuan, 2012. "Untangling the associations among distrust, race, and neighborhood social environment: A social disorganization perspective," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 74(9), pages 1342-1352.
    14. Bradby, Hannah, 2012. "Race, ethnicity and health: The costs and benefits of conceptualising racism and ethnicity," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 75(6), pages 955-958.
    15. Kara Chan & Sherrill Evans & Marcus Chiu & Peter Huxley & Yu-Leung Ng, 2015. "Relationship Between Health, Experience of Discrimination, and Social Inclusion Among Mental Health Service Users in Hong Kong," Social Indicators Research: An International and Interdisciplinary Journal for Quality-of-Life Measurement, Springer, vol. 124(1), pages 127-139, October.
    16. Paula M. Frew & Jay T. Schamel & Kelli A. O’Connell & Laura A. Randall & Sahithi Boggavarapu, 2015. "Results of a Community Randomized Study of a Faith-Based Education Program to Improve Clinical Trial Participation among African Americans," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 13(1), pages 1-12, December.
    17. Gee, Gilbert C. & Spencer, Michael & Chen, Juan & Yip, Tiffany & Takeuchi, David T., 2007. "The association between self-reported racial discrimination and 12-month DSM-IV mental disorders among Asian Americans nationwide," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 64(10), pages 1984-1996, May.
    18. Ana Isabel Maldonado & Carol B. Cunradi & Anna María Nápoles, 2020. "Racial/Ethnic Discrimination and Intimate Partner Violence Perpetration in Latino Men: The Mediating Effects of Mental Health," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 17(21), pages 1-17, November.
    19. Harnois, Catherine E. & Bastos, João L. & Campbell, Mary E. & Keith, Verna M., 2019. "Measuring perceived mistreatment across diverse social groups: An evaluation of the Everyday Discrimination Scale," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 232(C), pages 298-306.
    20. Gee, Gilbert & Walsemann, Katrina, 2009. "Does health predict the reporting of racial discrimination or do reports of discrimination predict health? Findings from the National Longitudinal Study of Youth," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 68(9), pages 1676-1684, May.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:sae:anname:v:661:y:2015:i:1:p:143-159. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: SAGE Publications (email available below). General contact details of provider: .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.