Cousin Marriages ― Between Tradition, Genetic Risk and Cultural Change

Anthropologists and geneticists from Europe and Israel present 10 essays on the understandings and influence of genetic risk in state health policies related to cousin marriages. They consider the trends and themes in state and local people's perceptions of cousin marriages in light of discourses on risk in societies in the Middle East, Mediterranean, and Europe, and minority populations of Middle Eastern and South Asian origin in Europe, and how biomedical identification of genetic risk is being accommodated within genetic service provisions and their effects on societal change. They discuss the global prevalence and trends in cousin marriage; how estimates of genetic risk can be made; case studies of countries where cousin marriage is common and where genetic risk discourse focuses on disorders like sickle cell anemia, thalassemia, and hemoglobin disorders; migrant populations in Europe and the negative public perception of cousin marriage in debates about integration and immigration, especially for Muslim minorities, and the construction of cousin marriage as forced marriage; and testing and screening programs aimed at managing the elevated genetic risk for the ultra-Orthodox Jewish community, Arab-Bedouins in Israel, and British Pakistani families. Annotation c2015 Ringgold, Inc., Portland, OR (protoview.com)

Alison Shaw is Professor of Social Anthropology in the Nuffield Department of Population Health at the University of Oxford. Her research focuses on ethnicity and health; social aspects of genetics; kinship, gender and transnational marriages. Her publications include Kinship and Continuity: Pakistani Families in Britain (2000) and Negotiating Risk: British Pakistani Experiences of Genetics (2009).