Abstract
In this chapter we discuss genetic science as a manifestation of modernity. Accordingly, we will, firstly, discuss the notion of modernity. Modernity will be understood and presented as epoch, as cultural and mental disposition. We will deploy a conceptual constellation which denotes specific and typical, constituting and regulating elements of modernity. Secondly, we will turn to the early developments of heredity and to genetics as science and as practice with regard to key elements of modernity as disposition, and with regard to their significance for images of what man would be, could be, should be. We conclude the chapter with some reflections on the relation between contemporary modern institutions and dispositions, and the swiftly emerging new insights and practices of genetics. Genetics represents an emergence through which modernity modernises itself.
| Original language | English |
|---|---|
| Title of host publication | Culture and Biology. Perspectives on the European Modern Age |
| Editors | Richard Nate, Bea Klüsener |
| Publisher | Verlag Königshausen & Neumann |
| Pages | 43-56 |
| ISBN (Print) | 382604553X |
| Publication status | Published - 2011 |
Subject classification (UKÄ)
- Ethnology
- Sociology (excluding Social Work, Social Psychology and Social Anthropology)
Free keywords
- Modernity
- genetics
- contingency
- emergence