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Race and Criminology in the Age of Genomic Science
Author(s) -
Walsh Anthony,
Yun Ilhong
Publication year - 2011
Publication title -
social science quarterly
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.482
H-Index - 90
eISSN - 1540-6237
pISSN - 0038-4941
DOI - 10.1111/j.1540-6237.2011.00818.x
Subject(s) - race (biology) , ethnic group , sociology , nothing , population , criminology , term (time) , genealogy , epistemology , demography , anthropology , gender studies , history , philosophy , physics , quantum mechanics
Objective To survey the contemporary literature in the social and biological sciences relevant to race that examines both the reality and the usefulness of the concept. Race is considered a major correlate of criminal behavior, and thus a fresh look at the concept is of obvious importance to criminologists and sociologists. Method Social, genetic, medical, and criminology databases were keyword searched for articles on race that either addressed its existence/nonexistence or usefulness as a concept. Results We find that biologist and social constructionists talk past one another and never venture beyond the comfort of their own positions. Genetic studies using very few chromosomal loci find that genetic polymorphisms divide human populations into clusters with almost 100 percent accuracy and that they correspond to the traditional anthropological categories. Conclusion There is much to gain by recognizing that these categories differ genetically, and that we can dispense with the term race in favor of some other term such as population or ethnic group and nothing would be lost except a word.