SLT Understanding Race: A Chat about Genetics and the Social Construction of Race

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g_EDVmXP4pM

Join me as I show how I teach the section of an anthropology class that focuses on race. In this video, I explain our understanding of genetic traits, natural selection, and DNA for a brief summary of our scientific understanding of race. I then review the history of the social construction of race, and the ramifications that we see today. It's a long video, but my hope is that by the end you'll have a real holistic understanding of what we mean when we say that there's no such thing as race, but that race is so important to consider as a social construct.

Images in video:

Peppered Moths https://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-36424768

Red Pea Plant: https://neeraseeds.com/products/heirloom-non-gmo-deep-red-sweet-pea-flower-seeds-for-garden-planting-fragrant-climbing-blooms

White Pea Plant: https://www.rareseeds.com/butterfly-pea-white-queen

Photo 51 of DNA | UK Research and Innovation: https://www.ukri.org/blog/from-the-archive-rosalind-franklins-famous-photo-51/

DNA Double Helix: https://www.genome.gov/About-Genomics/Introduction-to-Genomics

Human Genome Project Logo: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_Genome_Project

Skin Tones: https://news.illinoisstate.edu/2022/03/makeup-lacks-options-for-individuals-with-different-skin-tones/

Mentioned in video:

PTC Gene: https://learn.genetics.utah.edu/content/basics/ptc/

Darwin & Wallace Natural Selection: https://evolution.berkeley.edu/the-history-of-evolutionary-thought/1800s/natural-selection-charles-darwin-alfred-russel-wallace/

Silver Fox Domestication: https://www.youtube.com/shorts/CHH4kaOmPbs

Why Pigs Revert: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tA3voDDlfkc&t=30s

Franklin, Watson, and Crick: https://www.kcl.ac.uk/the-story-behind-photograph-51

The Invention of Race | Seen on Radio Podcast: https://exchange.prx.org/pieces/218457?m=false

Vitamin D in the Evolution of Human Skin Color: https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0306987709005544

Blue-eyed humans have a single common ancestor: https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2008/01/080130170343.htm

Developing lactose tolerance: https://www.npr.org/sections/thesalt/2012/12/27/168144785/an-evolutionary-whodunit-how-did-humans-develop-lactose-tolerance

Eugenics in the US: https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC1299061/

Sterilization in Puerto Rico: https://www.hhrjournal.org/2025/04/21/from-forced-sterilization-to-fertility-technology-addressing-medical-mistrust-in-puerto-rico/

Interracial Marriage: https://www.aclusd.org/news/loving-day-54/

Native American boarding schools: https://www.history.com/articles/how-boarding-schools-tried-to-kill-the-indian-through-assimilation

Inter Caetera Papal Bull: https://www.gilderlehrman.org/history-resources/spotlight-primary-source/doctrine-discovery-1493

Sweetness and Power | Sidney Mintz: https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/322123/sweetness-and-power-by-sidney-w-mintz/

Stuffed and Starved | Raj Patel: https://rajpatel.org/2009/10/27/stuffed-and-starved/

Franz Boas: https://blog.routledge.com/social-sciences/who-was-franz-boas-and-why-should-we-read-him-today/

TEK: http://ankn.uaf.edu/IKS/tek.html

Theory of Cultural Relativism: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZCn3nsAyQiw

Critical Race Theory: https://www.denisonforum.org/resources/what-is-critical-race-theory

Characterizations of Criminal Athletes: https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/08838151.2011.620664

U.S. Census | Middle Eastern & Northern African: https://www.pbs.org/newshour/politics/u-s-census-changes-how-it-identifies-people-by-race-and-ethnicity-creates-middle-eastern-and-north-african-category-for-first-time

How to be an Anti-Racist | Ibram X Kendi: https://www.ibramxkendi.com/how-to-be-an-antiracist

Virginia Codes Partus sequitur ventrum: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Partus_sequitur_ventrem

Native American Boarding Schools: https://www.nationalgeographic.com/history/article/a-century-of-trauma-at-boarding-schools-for-native-american-children-in-the-united-states

The Transcontinental Railroad: https://www.loc.gov/collections/railroad-maps-1828-to-1900/articles-and-essays/history-of-railroads-and-maps/the-transcontinental-railroad/

The Chinese Exclusion Act: https://www.facinghistory.org/resource-library/chinese-exclusion-act

Japanese American Internment Camps: https://www.nationalww2museum.org/war/articles/japanese-american-incarceration

Japanese American Soldiers serving in WWII: https://www.nps.gov/wwii/learn/historyculture/japanese-americans-at-war.htm

Bracero Program: http://guides.loc.gov/latinx-civil-rights/bracero-program

DACA: https://www.ncsl.org/immigration/deferred-action-for-childhood-arrivals

Redlining: https://www.federalreservehistory.org/essays/redlining

Denial of Loans to Black activists in the 1960s: https://foodprint.org/issues/black-land-loss-in-the-united-states/

Underfunding Black, Latino, and Native American school districts: https://edtrust.org/press-room/school-districts-that-serve-students-of-color-receive-significantly-less-funding/