While the sequencing of the human genome was a landmark achievement, the availability and manipulation of such a vast amount of data about our species inevitably led to questions that are increasingly fundamental and urgent. Now that information about human bodies can be transformed into a natural resource, how will we—and should we—interpret and use it? This talk draws on more than a decade of research—-in molecular biology labs, commercial startups, governmental agencies, and civic spaces—-to examine how genomics may be transformed from an information science practiced by a few well-financed scientists and engineers in the West, to a struggle for membership in twenty-first century societies embraced by peoples all over the world.

Hosted by: Department of Media & Cinema Studies

In conjunction with: Beckman Institute for Advanced Science and Technology, Carl R. Woese institute for Genomic Biology, College of Media, Critical Technology Studies Lab, NCSA, Illinois Program for Research in the Humanities, Learning to See Systems INTERSECT Group, Recovering Prairie Futures Research Cluster, School of Information Sciences, Spurlock Museum

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