From the Archive: The Saturday Rumpus Essay: DNA
Of course, maybe dividing the world into two kinds of people is just another way of making sure there is a crack in everything. When can you smooth out this fault line?
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Join NOW!Of course, maybe dividing the world into two kinds of people is just another way of making sure there is a crack in everything. When can you smooth out this fault line?
...moreGeorgina Lawton discusses her debut memoir, RACELESS.
...moreVivian Gibson discusses her debut memoir, THE LAST CHILDREN OF MILL CREEK.
...moreThe first time I had my breasts removed was hard. The second time, less so.
...moreThe realm of sound yields to me, sits at my feet. I can switch on. Or not.
...moreTo watch Jersey Shore is to watch my fantasy, only it’s an imperfect recreation.
...moreI married a man who is related to me. I started dating him when I was seventeen and of course, my mother immediately liked him. He grew up in my parents’ hometown.
...moreThe poet Brionne Janae discusses her debut poetry collection After Jubilee, intergenerational trauma, and writing her way into historical personae.
...moreBut still: A pattern. The trauma had been diluted by time. But, it was still present, still discernible, in my blood.
...moreTo this day no one really knows where my kris came from or whether or not it’s a significant part of my family history, if it’s a random object or an heirloom with an untold story.
...moreI’ve become an abridged version of myself—made half-done and meager. Made hungry for answers.
...moreWhen I was young, she would tell me we were part Navajo.
...moreIf Klingon is a living language then Latin sure as hell isn’t dead. “I think therefore I am,” but for animals. Solving history’s mysteries with poop. The Internet is ruining the planet in more ways than you think.
...moreThere were chains. History books always describe the chains.
...more[T]he questions pile up, never to be answered.
...moreThere were “good” families and “bad” families, and even I, an outsider, was quickly apprised of which was which.
...moreTrauma haunts your DNA. Robots at CVS. Erik Larson’s favorite gadgets. Drones do good? Shrooms, science, and Beatrix Potter.
...moreWhile concerns over the accuracy and invasiveness of the technology are important, the primary fear I have is that the technology available today masks a form of gender and racial stereotyping with the scientific authority of genetics. Heather Dewey-Hagborg considers the implications of a new law enforcement tool called “Forensic DNA Phenotyping” in an essay over […]
...more(Dan Weiss is out on tour with his band The Yellow Dress. He’ll be back on August 3rd.) The murder she never committed. Our parents’ patriotism. The Father, Son and Holy Surfboard. DNA science is not absolute. The synecdoche falls down first.
...moreAs the amount of digital data in the world balloons, so do the costs of storing that data. Some scientists are experimenting with ways to save data on a “device” much older—but also much more efficient—than hard drives: DNA itself. The first thing they encoded on a double helix of nucleotides? A text file containing […]
...moreThe Large Hadron Collider has started up again. The collisions aren’t supposed to begin until January, which is ahead of schedule. Perhaps that’s why there hasn’t been a big-budget disaster flick about it–still time to get something on the SyFy Original Movie front. Next time you go for sushi, you might wonder if that’s really […]
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