Making the Mexican Diabetic: Race, Science, and the Genetics of Inequality

Type 2 diabetes is one of the most widespread chronic illnesses, and it strikes some ethnic groups far more often than others. Michael J. Montoya asks how genomic research into the disease is shaped by the racial categories that lie behind it.

The book is an ethnography that traces the path of blood donated by Mexican-American donors as it moves into laboratories searching for genetic contributions to diabetes. Along the way Montoya examines the politics and ethics of the research process itself.

Readers interested in race, medicine, and the social life of genetic science will find the study a close and critical account of how one biomedical research effort operates.

Bibliographic details: published by University of California Press, with the ISBN-13 9780520267305.