Gene therapy is a technology that involves the introduction of therapeutic genes into humans for the replacement of mutations causing disorders. This article stems from research conducted with a thalassemia patients’ association in Cyprus and explores how political and epistemic uncertainty surrounding the promise of breakthrough in gene therapy is harnessed to particular objectives and narratives for the future. Anthropologists who survey the future largely address the manner in which people orient themselves in conditions of uncertainty through concepts of hope, waiting, patience, and endurance. Less attention has been paid to how people construct and deploy narratives and images of the future in a way that can bridge present immediacy and abstract futurity—a process I call directing the future. The concept I use to elucidate the connections between breakthrough and narrative is that of subjunctivity. In juxtaposing different positionalities that thalassemia patients in Cyprus adopt with regard to the promise of gene therapy, I show that subjunctivity is not only the ability to be receptive to transformation and the possibility of a world otherwise. The intersubjective and political processes out of which subjunctivity and narrative emerge are also the processes by which an otherwise undefined future becomes ordered, and certain images of the future attain more gravity and reality than others.

中文翻译：

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指导塞浦路斯基因治疗的未来：突破，虚拟与叙事的语用

基因治疗是一种涉及将治疗性基因引入人类以替代引起疾病的突变的技术。本文来自塞浦路斯地中海贫血症患者协会的一项研究，探讨了围绕基因治疗突破前景的政治和认知不确定性如何被用于未来的特定目标和叙述。人类学家对未来进行了调查，主要通过希望，等待，耐心和耐力的概念来解决人们在不确定的情况下如何适应自己的方向。人们如何以能够桥接当前的即时性和抽象的未来性的方式来构建和部署关于未来的叙事和图像的关注较少，我称之为引导未来的过程。我用来阐明突破与叙事之间联系的概念是虚拟性。将塞浦路斯的地中海贫血患者在基因治疗前景方面的不同立场并列在一起，我表明虚拟性不仅是接受转化的能力，而且还在于世界的可能性。产生主观性和叙述性的主体间和政治过程也是使原本就没有定义的未来变得有序的过程，并且某些未来的图像比其他图像具有更多的重力和现实。我证明，虚拟性不仅是接受变革的能力，而且还在于世界的可能性。产生主观性和叙述性的主体间和政治过程也是使原本就没有定义的未来变得有序的过程，并且某些未来的图像比其他图像具有更多的重力和现实。我证明，虚拟性不仅是接受变革的能力，而且还在于世界的可能性。产生主观性和叙述性的主体间和政治过程也是使原本就没有定义的未来变得有序的过程，并且某些未来的图像比其他图像具有更多的重力和现实。