“We are all cousins.” Belgian ancestry and genomic testing in a close-knit community in Northeastern Wisconsin

Drawing on an ethnography of Wisconsin-based descendants of Belgian immigrants, this article explores social dynamics relating to ways lay users of genomic ancestry testing (GAT) understand genomic ancestry and how their understanding raises questions concerning the construction of their identities. The study focuses on a group that presents interesting features for which the existing literature is sparse (i.e. a rather secure Belgian ancestry/present identity, the absence of a clear ascription to the category “Belgium/Belgian” from the tests, and a biological connectedness in the Belgian comm... Mehr ...