Political mediations of kinship: time, documents and DNA

Abstract

In this paper, we draw on literature from both science and technology studies and the anthropology of kinship, we describe a political movement aimed at legal reparation for human rights violations perpetrated by the Brazilian government against children of the compulsorily institutionalized patients of Hansen’s disease. We conduct our investigation by exploring the action of intertwining technologies – narrated recollections, written documents, and the DNA test – employed by major actors to “reckon” the family connections at the core of this drama. The notion of technologies helps underline not only the materiality of certain processes, but also the complex temporalities at play. Responding to a challenge proposed by Janet Carsten, our ultimate aim is to show how political events as well as collective institutionalized structures – operating through the mediation of these diverse technologies – produce a particular kind of sociality, interwoven with perceptions of family and community.