Tagged: Biology and Society

Class & Stratification / Science & Technology / Social Psychology & Lifecourse / Sociology of Culture

The Potential of Epigenetics for Sociology

A careful understanding of epigenetic mechanisms allows sociologists to include a new biological perspective into research designs – when it is incorporated carefully and not used casually or blindly as a deus ex machina explanatory device that is. Epigenetics provides us with one of several “mechanisms by which social influences become embodied” (Kuzawa and Sweet 2008: 2). A promising place for sociologists to enter into this research or use it fruitfully is to examine how social environments and inequalities become embodied...

Gender & Sexuality / Science & Technology

Unintended Consequences

by dsantore   Prostate cancer patient Dana Jennings (who also happens to be a New York Times editor) has us thinking again about just what it means to be a man.  Jennings, who was diagnosed earlier this year, is learning about the ironic, gendered side effects associated with his cancer treatment.  According to Jennings, one of the drugs prescribed to him, Lupron, is a “testosterone suppressant, designed to starve hormone-dependent cancer cells of the fuel (testosterone) that they crave in...