User:Lindsmach/Genographic Project

Criticism
Shortly after the announcement of the project in April 2005, the Indigenous Peoples Council on Biocolonialism (IPCB) noted its connections to controversial issues (such as concern among some tribes that the results of genetic human migration studies might indicate that Native Americans are not indigenous to North America). The IPCB recommended against indigenous people participating. --- Copied from Genographic Project

The reason why Indigenous people were discouraged to participate in the Genographic Project is offered by the claims of the founder of IPCB Debra Harry. According to Harry, a Northern Paiute Native American and Associate Professor in Indigenous Studies at Nevada University, The Genographic project resulted in a human genetic testing practice that appeared to mask an ulterior motive rather than mere scientific research. Particularly, the great concern about the possible political interest behind the Genographic Project, motivated the IPCB to preemptively alert the global indigenous community on the “not so altruistic motivations” of the project. Additionally, IPCB argues that the Genographic project not only provides no direct benefit to Indigenous peoples but instead raises considerable risks. Such risks, raised by Harry in an interview released in December 2005, were used to advocate against the indigenous participation in the project. Another comment made by IPCB founder Debra Harry was that the Genographic Project served as a method to discredit kin relations through the possibility that ancestral identities may be invalidated and to deny Indigenous peoples’ access and authority over the resource-rich territories that they had for long inhabited. The IPCB also identified another attempt of Biocolonialism in the Genographic Project. The latter involved the high probability of genetic testing results producing errors such as false negatives and positives that lead to the misidentification of Native people as non-Native and vice versa. Another negative consequence expressed by TallBear is the risk that an individual's cultural identity can be conclusively established through biocolonialist projects such as the Genographic Project. Ultimately, TallBear's argument is in close agreement with Harry's concerns regarding the Genographic Project and serves as a significant force motivating IPCB to advocate against Biocolonialism.