Description
Images and representations of DNA and genetic information have become some of the most widely recognized and well-established scientific images in the twenty-first century. This thesis explores the meanings that have become associated with DNA and the gene by using Charles Sanders Peirce’s semiotic model to analyze images from Time magazine covers spanning the last 50 years, using Charles Sanders Peirce’s semiotic model. An examination of DNA as a rhetorical object and cultural icon provides context to understand how Direct-to-Consumer (DTC) tests such as 23andMe's ancestry and health tests have become so popular and profitable. Due to the contemporary relevance of at-home genetic testing, the larger part of this thesis will examine the following two groups of images from 23andMe's website: the images on ancestry test results and the marketing images for their genetic health test. To ascertain how these images have reinforced the gene's cultural meaning in the last decade, I will analyze a second group of images from 23andMe's ancestry test results using Roland Barthes's “Myth Today” as a model for discussing images in the context of myth. I argue that the popularity of genetic ancestry tests reflects a cultural desire for understanding identity, and that visualizations of DNA and the gene have taken part in shaping contemporary American cultural identity by appealing to a sort of “genetic essentialism.” A critical examination of the third group of images marketing 23andMe's health test using Michel Foucault's notions of biopower and biopolitics, as outlined in The History of Sexuality, also introduces current ethical questions regarding the new and rapidly growing market of DTC genetic tests.
Key terms: DNA, Direct-to-consumer genetic test, Biopolitics and biopower, gene fetishism, identity, semiotics, genetic essentialism
