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HUGERA @hugeraproject.bsky.social · 03/09/2026

Prof. Emma Kowal (Deakin University) kicks off our Fall speaker series with the talk “Folding race: The 88-year story of the ‘first Aboriginal genome'” on September 8th @ 12 PM BST. You can register to attend via zoom here: hugera.org/lecture-seri...

Title: Folding race: The 88-year story of the ‘first Aboriginal genome'

Emma Kowal (Deakin University) is a cultural and medical anthropologist who previously worked as a medical doctor and public health researcher in Indigenous health. Her research lies at the intersection of anthropology, science and technology studies (STS), and Indigenous studies. Her books include Trapped in the Gap: Doing Good in Indigenous Australia, the collection Cryopolitics: Frozen Life in a Melting World, and Haunting Biology: Science and Indigeneity in Australia.

Abstract: Making his way home from the 1923 Pan-Pacific Science Congress, British ethnologist Alfred Haddon caught the Trans-Australian Railway from Sydney to meet his ocean liner in Perth. At a short stop at Golden Ridge siding, east of Kalgoorlie, he cut a dreadlock from the head of an unidentified ‘young Aboriginal man’. It contributed to Haddon’s extensive hair collection, the basis of his theory of three races based on hair form. In 1945 it was moved from the Cambridge Museum of Archeology and Anthropology to the newly established Duckworth Laboratory under the directorship of physical anthropologist Jack Trevor, a signatory of the 1951 UNESCO Statement on Race.

It stayed there until Danish evolutionary biologist Eske Willerslev obtained it, extracted DNA from it and published the ‘first Aboriginal genome’ in 2011. The landmark paper established a longer history of Aboriginal Australian genetic distinctiveness than any previous research: 70,000 years. In the process of publishing it, Willerslev established a new standard of international ethical practice, consulting with the Goldfields Land and Sea Council in Western Australia. This paper traces the story of this particular piece of human biology from a remote railway siding to Cambridge, Copenhagen and Kalgoorlie. It explores the material entanglement of interwar race science, postwar scientific anti-racism and 21st century Indigenous genomics.

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HUGERA @hugeraproject.bsky.social · 11/05/2026

Prof. Steve Sturdy continues our spring speaker series with the talk “Eugenics and Bioeconomic Value” on June 2nd. You can register to attend via zoom here: hugera.org/lecture-seri...

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HUGERA @hugeraproject.bsky.social · 01/05/2026

The deadline has been extended to May 5th to submit to Our project's symposium "Panel #106: Human Genomics in the Global Economy" at the next 4S Conference, in Toronto (Oct 7 – 10). Please consider submitting your abstract! More information can be found here: hugera.org/2026/04/15/j...

hugera.org

JOIN US AT 4S! - HUGERA

Our project is organizing an open symposium at the next 4S Conference, in Toronto (Oct 7 – 10). Please consider submitting your abstract! Info below: Panel #106: Human Genomics in the Global Economy ...

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HUGERA @hugeraproject.bsky.social · 16/04/2026

Our project is organizing an open symposium "Panel #106: Human Genomics in the Global Economy" at the next 4S Conference, in Toronto (Oct 7 – 10). Please consider submitting your abstract! More information can be found here: hugera.org/2026/04/15/j...

hugera.org

JOIN US AT 4S! - HUGERA

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HUGERA @hugeraproject.bsky.social · 25/03/2026

Dr. Phila M. Msimang continues our spring speaker series with the talk “Is diversity higher? Against the superficial inclusion of racial and ethnic groups in biomedical and clinical research” on April 5th. You can register to attend via zoom here: hugera.org/lecture-seri...

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HUGERA @hugeraproject.bsky.social · 02/03/2026

Reminder that the HUGERA online lecture series continues on March 3rd with the talk "Lessons from Stateville: Race, Genetics, and the Biological Search for a Social Kind". You can register to attend via zoom: hugera.org/lecture-seri...

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HUGERA @hugeraproject.bsky.social · 27/02/2026

The HUGERA online lecture series continues on March 3rd! You can Register to attend via zoom: hugera.org/lecture-seri...

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HUGERA @hugeraproject.bsky.social · 02/02/2026

Reminder that Prof. Duana Fullwiley (Stanford University) kicks off our spring speaker series with the talk “Into the Lab: Racial World Building and its Discontents” on February 3rd. You can register to attend via zoom here:https://hugera.org/lecture-series/

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HUGERA @hugeraproject.bsky.social · 28/01/2026

Prof. Duana Fullwiley (Stanford University) kicks off our spring speaker series with the talk “Into the Lab: Racial World Building and its Discontents” on February 3rd. You can register to attend via zoom here: hugera.org/lecture-seri...

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HUGERA @hugeraproject.bsky.social · 26/11/2025

Dr. Yasmin Haddad (Postdoctoral Fellow at UQAM) continues our online speaker series with the talk "When imprecision is a bad thing: the case of ancestry" on December 2nd. You can register to attend via zoom here: hugera.org/lecture-seri...

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HUGERA @hugeraproject.bsky.social · 28/10/2025

Prof. Sarah Abel (Instituto de Investigaciones Filosóficas, UNAM) continues our online speaker series with the talk "Should genomic knowledge change our personal conceptions of race? (And, if so, how?)" on November 4th. You can Register to attend via zoom: hugera.org/lecture-seri...

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HUGERA @hugeraproject.bsky.social · 14/10/2025

Prof. Katharina Schramm (Universität Bayreuth) kicks off our speaker series with the talk “We are all Africans! Antiracist projects and racializing practices in South Africa post-apartheid genomics” on October 21st. You can register to attend via zoom here: hugera.org/lecture-seri...

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HUGERA @hugeraproject.bsky.social · 09/10/2025

Is current Human Genomics reifying Race? Hugera's PI Celso Neto addresses this question on Monday at ROTO Lecture Series.

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Reposted by HUGERA

RUB History & Philosophy of Science @roto-rub.bsky.social · 06/10/2025

Next Monday, we start the new Lecture Series! We're very happy to welcome @celsoneto.bsky.social as our first speaker. 🤩 Celso will talk about race reification and population descriptors in human genomics. Just register here to participate: rotorub.wordpress.com/roto-lecture... #PhilSci #PhilMed

Poster for the talk by Celso Neto (University of Exeter), entitled "Race Reification and Population Descriptors in Human Genomics". It will take place on Monday, 13 October 2025, at 4 pm (CET) via Zoom.

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HUGERA @hugeraproject.bsky.social · 02/10/2025

Hello BLue-Sky, are you interested in the study of the social implications of genomics? Our project brings together philosophers, social scientists, and geneticists to address this question. Follow us here and sign-up for our mailing list at Hugera.org/contact/ #philsky #STS #metascience

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Contact - HUGERA

The HUGERA team welcomes new collaborators and partners, within and outside academia. Most of our activities, such as lectures and workshops, are open. To know more about our activities, join our mail...

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