Origin - Jennifer Raff

 Sub-title: A Genetic History of the Americas

I've been reading recently published books addressing genetics and DNA.  This one came to my attention in my social media feed and I had to wait several weeks for it to be available at the library.

The author is an anthropologist and geneticist with the University of Kansas.  While she is letting the research on ancient remains tell the story of how the Americas may have bee populated, her larger message is that the scientific community and the general public needs to seek out and respect the Native Americans who are the modern descendants of the peoples they study and research and that we should be collaborating with them, as she does.

I enjoyed the summary of the science to date, the history of the finds and analysis of the on-site anthropological materials as well as the laboratory work done to analyze DNA.  A good read that brought into perspective the studies being done to trace our human family.  I will be interested to see what fellow genealogists who have researched Native American DNA think of her book.

Quotes:

p. 150 - She provides an explanation of extensive lab procedures for cleanliness and to avoid contamination as "...a contract between ourselves [scientists] and the Indigenous peoples who have given us permission to conduct this work" that demonstrates the ethics of anthropology and genetics.

p. 198 - She describes the parallels between the evolution of dogs as contributing to being "...able to get insights into human story from an unexpected source: the genomes of dogs."

p. 256 - "...the Common Rule, which underlies ethical oversight of research on humans (governed by Institutional Review Boards or IRBs) does not apply to ancient humans.  NAGPRA, the law the governs human remains and artifacts associated with descendant tribe, does not apply to the remains of ancient people found on private property."

p. 261 - "For Indigenous peoples this [Native American heritage] is not a minor or abstract issue; giving legitimacy to the notion that one can claim Native identify via a DNA test or family legend without any connection to present-day tribes is an implicit threat to tribal sovereignty....Because of widespread interest ...commercial ancestry testing services are intensely focused on obtaining Native American DNA from tribal members...met with a fair amount of resistance.  The marketing of ancestor test as "telling you who you are" is not accurate.  It boils down to this - what makes a person Indigenous is not a subject on which I- or any other non-Native geneticist- can speak with any authority or knowledge."

Published: 2022  Read: May 2022  Genre: Science