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Writing, printing, speaking: Rhesus blood-group genetics and nomenclatures in the mid-twentieth century
In the 1940s and 1950s, British and American journals published a flood of papers by doctors, pathologists, geneticists and anthropologists debating the virtues of two competing nomenclatures used to denote the Rhesus blood groups. Accounts of this prolonged and often bitter episode have tended to f...
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Published in: | The British journal for the history of science 2014-06, Vol.47 (2), p.335-361 |
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description | In the 1940s and 1950s, British and American journals published a flood of papers by doctors, pathologists, geneticists and anthropologists debating the virtues of two competing nomenclatures used to denote the Rhesus blood groups. Accounts of this prolonged and often bitter episode have tended to focus on the main protagonists' personalities and theoretical commitments. Here I take a different approach and use the literature generated by the dispute to recover the practical and epistemic functions of nomenclatures in genetics. Drawing on recent work that views inscriptions as part of the material culture of science, I use the Rhesus controversy to think about the ways in which geneticists visualized and negotiated their objects of research, and how they communicated and collaborated with workers in other settings. Extending recent studies of relations between different media, I consider the material forms of nomenclatures, as they were jotted in notebooks, printed in journals, scribbled on blackboards and spoken out loud. The competing Rhesus nomenclatures had different virtues as they were expressed in different media and made to embody commitments to laboratory practices. In exploring the varied practical and epistemic qualities of nomenclatures I also suggest a new understanding of the Rhesus controversy itself. |
doi_str_mv | 10.1017/S0007087413000332 |
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Accounts of this prolonged and often bitter episode have tended to focus on the main protagonists' personalities and theoretical commitments. Here I take a different approach and use the literature generated by the dispute to recover the practical and epistemic functions of nomenclatures in genetics. Drawing on recent work that views inscriptions as part of the material culture of science, I use the Rhesus controversy to think about the ways in which geneticists visualized and negotiated their objects of research, and how they communicated and collaborated with workers in other settings. Extending recent studies of relations between different media, I consider the material forms of nomenclatures, as they were jotted in notebooks, printed in journals, scribbled on blackboards and spoken out loud. The competing Rhesus nomenclatures had different virtues as they were expressed in different media and made to embody commitments to laboratory practices. In exploring the varied practical and epistemic qualities of nomenclatures I also suggest a new understanding of the Rhesus controversy itself.</abstract><cop>Cambridge, UK</cop><pub>Cambridge University Press</pub><pmid>24941737</pmid><doi>10.1017/S0007087413000332</doi><tpages>27</tpages><oa>free_for_read</oa></addata></record> |
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source | International Bibliography of the Social Sciences (IBSS); Art, Design and Architecture Collection; JSTOR Archival Journals and Primary Sources Collection【Remote access available】; Cambridge University Press |
subjects | 20th century Alleles Animals Antigens Antiserum Blood groups British Culture Floods Forensic genetics Genetic inheritance Genetic research Genetics Genetics - history History History of medicine and histology History of science History, 20th Century Human genetics Media Medical genetics Monkeys & apes Nomenclature Nomenclatures Printing Rh-Hr Blood-Group System - classification Rh-Hr Blood-Group System - genetics Rh-Hr Blood-Group System - history Rhesus Scientific publications Terminology Terminology as Topic U.S.A United Kingdom United States Writing |
title | Writing, printing, speaking: Rhesus blood-group genetics and nomenclatures in the mid-twentieth century |
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