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Accepted Paper:
Colonial unknowing and epigenetic knowledge production in Australia (or, "the epigenetics paper")
Henrietta Byrne
(University of Adelaide)
Jaya Keaney
(University of Melbourne)
This presentation explores how epigenetic knowledge production in Australia is being both supported and countered by Indigenous and non-Indigenous scholars, and how this relates to broader critiques of the epistemic power of biological sciences when making claims about trauma in colonial contexts.
Paper long abstract:
Epigenetics is a popular form of post-genomic science which seeks to show how environmental factors can get ‘under the skin’ and shape gene expression across generations. In colonial states such as Australia, this science is increasingly focusing on inter-generational trauma within Indigenous communities. In this presentation, we draw on interviews and fieldwork conducted in 2020-21 with Australian researchers and health workers to explore how current lively discourses about the change-making potential of epigenetic knowledge as related to trauma are being both circulated and contested, and relate these positions to broader critiques of the epistemic power of biological sciences when making claims about trauma in colonial contexts. In particular, we propose 'colonial unknowing' (Vimalassery et al, 2016) as a useful frame through which to view epigenetic knowledge production and scientific expertise in a colonial landscape, as it allows for a troubling of concepts of evidence and rediscovery.