Abstract
This essay examines the contemporary politics of race and pharmaceuticals, with a focus on BiDil, a heart failure medication approved by the Food and Drug Administration solely for blacks. Drawing on Michel Foucault’s work on biopower, the essay suggests that pharmaceuticals such as BiDil are implicated in what could be called a racial politics of life. This is a politics that takes as its object the biological vitality of the racial body. The essay pays attention both to the life-affirming aspects of this racial politics of life and to its exclusionary underside.
| Translated title of the contribution | For Blacks Only: Pharmaceuticals, Genetics, and the Racial Politics of Life |
|---|---|
| Original language | Italian |
| Pages (from-to) | 107-135 |
| Journal | materiali foucaultiani |
| Volume | I |
| Issue number | 2 |
| State | Published - 2012 |
Keywords
- biopower
- genetics
- racialized pharmaceuticals
- African Americans
- BiDil