Health, ethnicity, and diabetes : racialised constructions of 'risky' South Asian bodies

This book explores the often contentious relationship between health, concepts of race and ethnicity, and the impact on South Asian groups. Using medical sociological and anthropological perspectives, it excavates racialised constructions of diabetes ‘risk’ within discourses, and highlights the contrasting counter narratives in people’s accounts of their everyday lives. By identifying a number of components to the discursive, racialised construction of ‘risky’ South Asian bodies, this book problematises taken for granted understandings of culture, lifestyle and genetic risk. The mobilisation of these mechanisms in health science and interventions result in a racialising gaze, directed at groups already experiencing historically embedded race-related issues. The book situates these constructions of risk against the emergent, fluid and dynamic counter narratives to risk constructions. The new found momentum in genetic science is also critiqued in its formulation of racial-genetic risk, especially in the case of diabetes in South Asian groups, and is identified as perpetuating a series of racializing processes. Acknowledgments -- Contents -- 1: Introduction -- Outline of the Book -- References -- Part I : Contextualising the 'Risky' South Asian Diabetic Body -- 2: Conceptualising Race, Ethnicity, and Health -- Conceptualising Race and Ethnicity in Health -- 'Bio-race Thinking' -- 'Bio-moral Panics' -- Categories and Labels of Difference -- Epidemiology and Ethnicity: A Numbers Game? -- The Bio-politics of Difference and Health -- Conclusion -- References -- 3: Situating the South Asian Diabetic Risk -- Defining Diabetes -- Types of Diabetes -- A 'New' Condition? -- Complications -- Lay Health Experiences -- The Role of Biography -- What's in a Name? -- Misattributions of Causality -- Trends, Patterns, and the Politics of Counting: The Worldwide and UK Picture -- The South Asian Picture -- Conclusion -- References -- 4: Constructing the Risk: Faulty Lifestyles, Faulty Genes -- Linking the Personal and the Public: Diabetes as 'Trouble' and 'Issue' -- The Politics of 'Ethnic' Diabetes -- Ethnicity-Related Diabetes Initiatives -- The 'Thrifty Gene': Genetic Arguments, Diabetes, and Ethnicity -- Conclusion -- References -- 5: Method -- 'A Story ... Not THE Story' -- Diabetes: Not a Lone Project -- Why Hindu Gujaratis? -- Gujarat -- 'Researcher' and 'Researched' Roles: The Politics of Minding and Bridging the Gap -- References -- Part II: Resisting Constructions of Risk: The Counter-Narratives -- References -- 6: Doing Everyday Diabetes -- 'Community' -- Finding Out About the Diagnosis -- Checking the Diagnosis -- Familiarity or 'There's a Lot of It in Our Community!' -- 'Exercise' and Activity -- The Social and Cultural Context of Nutrition and Diabetes -- Resolving Everyday Conflicts: Food and Social Eating -- Conclusion -- References -- 7: Using Complementary Health and Remedies -- Introduction -- Using Traditional and Herbal Remedies Front Matter....Pages i-x Introduction....Pages 1-11 Front Matter....Pages 13-13 Conceptualising Race, Ethnicity, and Health....Pages 15-37 Situating the South Asian Diabetic Risk....Pages 39-59 Constructing the Risk: Faulty Lifestyles, Faulty Genes....Pages 61-86 Method....Pages 87-98 Front Matter....Pages 99-103 Doing Everyday Diabetes....Pages 105-128 Using Complementary Health and Remedies....Pages 129-145 Diabetes, Biography, and Community....Pages 147-166 ‘Race-ing’ Back to the Bio-genetic Future?....Pages 167-183 Conclusion....Pages 185-194 Back Matter....Pages 195-201