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TO TEST OR NOT? SINGULAR OR MULTIPLE HERITAGE?

Genomic Ancestry Testing and Americans’ Racial Identity

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  16 November 2015

Jennifer L. Hochschild  and
Maya Sen
Jennifer L. Hochschild*
Affiliation:
Departments of Government and African and African American Studies, Harvard University
Maya Sen
Affiliation:
Harvard Kennedy School, Harvard University
*
*Corresponding author: Jennifer Hochschild, Henry LaBarre Jayne Professor of Government and Professor of African and African American Studies, Harvard University, 1737 Cambridge St., Cambridge, MA 02138. E-mail: [email protected]
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Abstract

DNA ancestry testing may seem frivolous, but it points to two crucial questions: First, what is the relationship, if any, between biology and race? Second, how much and why do people prefer clear, singular racial identities over blurred, mixed racial self-understandings, or the reverse? We posit that individuals of different racial or ethnic backgrounds will have different levels of support for this new technology. In particular, despite the history of harm caused by the biologization of race, we theorize that African Americans will be receptive to the use of DNA ancestry testing because conventional genealogical searches for ancestral roots are mostly unavailable to them. This “broken chain” theory leads to two hypotheses, of disproportionately high Black interest in DNA ancestry testing—thus an implicit acceptance of a link between biology and race—and high acceptance among Blacks of multiple heritages despite a preference for evidence of roots in Africa.

To test these hypotheses, we analyze two databases of U.S. newspaper articles, one with almost 6,000 items and a second with 700. We also analyze two new public opinion surveys of nationally representative samples of adult Americans. Most of the evidence comes from the second survey, which uses vignettes to obtain views about varied results of DNA ancestry testing. We find that the media increasingly report on the links between genetic inheritance and race, and emphasize singular racial ancestry more than multiple heritages. The surveys show, consistent with our theory, that Blacks (and Hispanics, to some degree) are especially receptive to DNA ancestry testing, and are pleased with not only a finding of group singularity but also a finding of multiple points of origin. Qualitative readings of media reports illuminate some of the reasons behind these survey findings. We conclude with a brief discussion of the broader importance of DNA ancestry testing.

Keywords

BiologyGeneticsAncestryRacial IdentityRacial DefinitionsMultiracialismPublic Opinion
Type
State of the Art
Information
Du Bois Review: Social Science Research on Race , Volume 12 , Issue 2 , Fall 2015 , pp. 321 - 347
Copyright
Copyright © Hutchins Center for African and African American Research 2015 

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