Brave_New_Brains_Sociology_Family_and_th.pdf (217.36 kB)
Brave new brains: sociology, family and the politics of knowledge
journal contribution
posted on 2016-06-09, 11:45 authored by Val Gillies, Rosalind Edwards, Nicola HorsleyThis article critically explores sociological arguments for greater biosocial synthesis, centring contemporary developments in public policy to demonstrate how such a reframing of humanity tends to reinforce existing political orders and socially patterned normativities. The case for further amalgamation of the social and life sciences is examined to suggest that production of somatic markers of truth from relational encounters largely relies upon an anaemic and politically contained version of the social as acquired in early childhood. More specifically, the gendered, classed and culturally specific practice of parenting children has come to occupy a new significance in accounts of social brains and environmentally reactive genomes. This is highlighted through a discussion of ‘early intervention’ as a heavily biologized policy rationale framing opportunities for biosocial collaboration. It is argued that late capitalist objectives of personal investment and optimization are driving this assimilation of the social and life sciences, pursuing an agenda that traces and re-scores long-standing social divisions in the name of progress.
History
School
- Social Sciences
Department
- Communication, Media, Social and Policy Studies
Published in
The Sociological ReviewVolume
64Issue
2Pages
219 - 237Citation
GILLIES, V., EDWARDS, R. and HORSLEY, N., 2016. Brave new brains: sociology, family and the politics of knowledge. Sociological Review, 64 (2), pp.219-237.Publisher
© John Wiley & SonsVersion
- AM (Accepted Manuscript)
Publisher statement
This work is made available according to the conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International (CC BY-NC-ND 4.0) licence. Full details of this licence are available at: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/Publication date
2016Notes
This is the peer reviewed version of the following article: GILLIES, V., EDWARDS, R. and HORSLEY, N., 2016. Brave new brains: sociology, family and the politics of knowledge. Sociological Review, 64 (2), pp.219-237, which has been published in final form at http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/1467-954X.12374. This article may be used for non-commercial purposes in accordance with Wiley Terms and Conditions for Self-Archiving.ISSN
0038-0261eISSN
1467-954XPublisher version
Language
- en