What's Real about Race?: Untangling Science, Genetics, and Society

Rina Bliss

Book cover for What's Real about Race?: Untangling Science, Genetics, and Society
Book cover for What's Real about Race?: Untangling Science, Genetics, and Society

What's Real about Race?: Untangling Science, Genetics, and Society

What's Real about Race?: Untangling Science, Genetics, and Society

Rina Bliss

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Description

Biologically, race does not exist. Scientists have proven that human DNA is 99.9 percent identical. But we know that racism and its structural impacts shape our health, opportunities, and lives in profound ways. What is the true relationship between genetics and race? And how should we talk about identity in science and medicine?

In What's Real About Race?, sociologist Rina Bliss illuminates the truth about one of the most misunderstood, controversial concepts in our society and reveals why we cannot confuse race with genetic difference. Blending energizing prose with the latest in genetics research, this paradigm-shifting tour unmasks what's truly real about race: namely, racism's impact on our bodies and lives.

Bliss traces the history of race, revealing how unscientific categories of identity--White, Black, Asian/Pacific Islander, and American Indian/Alaska Native--became the modern standard, and illuminates how the myth of biological races endures in science and society, warping our understanding of complex topics like intelligence, disease susceptibility, and behavior. Along the way, What's Real About Race? busts enduring myths about IQ, ancestry tests, behavioral racism, and more. In fascinating explorations of gene research, medicine, and social justice, Bliss argues for a new way forward. To create equity in science and society, we must disentangle our understanding of genetics from identity and see race for what it really is: a purely social category

At a time when misinformation about our bodies and identities is dangerously prevalent, What's Real About Race? is an indispensable resource and a powerful reminder that, biologically, our similarities vastly outweigh our differences.

Critical Reviews

Passionate and powerful. An invaluable book for those working in genetics or healthcare...or anyone ever tempted to take a DNA ancestry test.--Angela Saini, author of Superior and The Patriarchs

With dazzling insight that braids together culture, history, science, and memoir, What's Real About Race? deeply enriches our understanding of one of humanity's most complex and dynamic concepts. Rina Bliss bravely and meticulously debunks the most pernicious fallacies about race and shines a light on the ways it remains all too real for people's lived experiences. This is essential reading for us all.--Alondra Nelson, Science, Technology, and Social Values Lab, Institute for Advanced Study and author of author of The Social Life of DNA

At the interfaces of science, society, and policy, this is a must-read. Rina Bliss is amazing at handling these tough topics with respect, documentation, engaging style and clarity.--George Church, professor of genetics at Harvard and MIT and author of Regenesis

What's Real about Race? is a tour de force of scholarly research and energizing prose that dissects one of the most misunderstood and misrepresented concepts in society today. It is not just informative--it is transformative, providing essential insights that will change the way we understand and engage with the world around us.--Ruha Benjamin, author of Imagination and Viral Justice

With personal anecdotes and deep history, this provocative account makes a forceful argument for disentangling racism from racialism, race from genetic ancestry, and for seeing race as a purely social category.--Dalton Conley, author of The Social Genome

Publishing Information

Publisher: W. W. Norton & Company
Pub date: 2026-01-06
Length: 192 pages

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