Mundane Genomics

Introduction

This book critically analyses the ongoing, often silent, expansion of genomics throughout society. Genomics has undeniably become an integral part of everyday life for many, albeit in ever-stratified ways, and this routinization process has come with interesting and often unpredicted consequences, interacting with national cultures, regulations, healthcare systems, patients, families, and more.

Drawing from STS, anthropology, sociology, and political science, this volume explores multiple case studies across the globe, illustrating how genomics spreads, transforms, and is being transformed, ultimately becoming a routine, almost mundane, part of our daily life.

The Realms of Mundane Genomics

The volume unpacks mundane genomics in five realms – assisted reproduction, genetic predisposition and the clinic, direct-to-consumer testing and the making of identities, forensics, and genomics imaginaries – presenting research that illuminates how genomics is no longer confined to the rhetoric of revolution, but increasingly operates within the contours of the everyday, with noteworthy implications for all the actors involved.