Epigenetics, education, and the plastic body: Changing concepts and new engagements

Martyn Pickersgill

doi:10.1177/0034523719867102

Abstract

Epigenetic processes, and the investigative practices that take these as their focus, are of increasing interest to a range of professionals beyond biomedicine. This has been piqued by, especially, the belief that bioscientific research is demonstrating new molecular mechanisms through which the social and physical environment impact upon the bodies of humans and other animals. Beyond the laboratory, epigenetic notions are entangled with wider ideas about the malleability of the soma (e.g., relating to neuroscience). In many contexts (including, to an extent, education), this intertwinement has contributed to producing and valourising a conception of a particularly plastic body. In this paper, I draw on a range of biomedical and education-related texts in order to outline and reflect upon the notions of ‘education’ and ‘epigenetics’ that are supported through and propelled by an array of writings that, to greater or lesser extents, bring these spheres of praxis into conversation. Discussions of epigenetics and stress, for instance, are framing certain kinds of educational work (e.g., with new parents) as a means of intervening in soma and society. In so doing, they implicitly extend ideas about what education is and what it can do. On the other hand, writings from educational researchers, for example, are enrolling epigenetic findings and ideas to support various positions or approaches. Many education researchers will be sceptical of some of the more hyperbolic assertations made about the significance of epigenetics. However, the fact that a nascent discourse connecting education and epigenetics is emerging is suggestive of a need for reciprocal, thoughtful, and critical exchange with bioscientists who seek to address educational issues, or whose work is being enrolled by others to do so.

Highlights

Epigenetic factors, as one review article in a contested epistemic space recently put it, ‘comprise the layer of regulatory information that is superimposed on the DNA sequence and imparts cell-type-specific function’ (Skvortsova et al, 2018: 1)
If not always closely predicated on it, there exists today a notion held by a range of actors that bioscientific research on epigenetics is generating new insights into the molecular mechanisms through which the social and physical environment impact upon the bodies of humans and other animals
At least to an extent, be regarded as affirming a malleable vision of ‘embedded bodies’ (Niewohner, 2011) that are always and essentially situated within and remade through particular social milieu. When such investigations transcend the physical and discursive limits of biomedical spaces, the language of epigenetics commonly comes to be mixed with additional understandings of how bodies and subjectivities can be reshaped through physical and interpersonal context (Pickersgill, 2018)

Summary

Introduction

Epigenetic factors, as one review article in a contested epistemic space recently put it, ‘comprise the layer of regulatory information that is superimposed on the DNA sequence and imparts cell-type-specific function’ (Skvortsova et al, 2018: 1). I track some of the ways in which epigenetic findings and concepts are invoked within discourse emerging from, seeking to address, and enjoining interventions based on education (as a field and set of practices).

Results

Conclusion