ABSTRACT Although the scientific community has frequently criticized the reliability and validity of direct-to-consumer ancestry DNA testing (DTC DNA), sales continue to rise, with an estimated 26 million U.S. American customers to date. This surge speaks to a desire among U.S. consumers to fulfill a symbolic need constructed by these DTC DNA companies. Using constitutive rhetoric as a methodological lens, we unravel the ways Ancestry® constitutes consumers, ideologically and narratively, as genetic carriers of ethnic ancestry. Specifically, we analyze 17 commercials that aired on cable television in the U.S. from 2015 to 2018. We argue that Ancestry® constitutes subjects as objective harbingers of DNA who form the basis of homogenous genetic ethnic communities, which obscures the scientific constraints of DTC DNA and the sociocultural consequences of linking genetics with ancestry. Ultimately, the rhetoric within these commercials paradoxically provides U.S. Americans a resource for uniqueness—to feel differentiated from everyone else, while encouraging them to feel a sense of belonging to some greater collectivity. Ancestry® capitalizes upon the appeal of symbolic ethnicity and perpetuates the idea that ethnicity is unproblematically biological, thus enabling and constraining identification accordingly.

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All hail DNA：AncestryDNA™ 广告的基本修辞

摘要 尽管科学界经常批评直接面向消费者的血统 DNA 测试 (DTC DNA) 的可靠性和有效性，但销售额仍在继续上升，迄今为止估计有 2600 万美国客户。这种激增说明美国消费者渴望满足这些 DTC DNA 公司构建的象征性需求。使用构成性修辞作为方法论镜头，我们揭示了 Ancestry® 在意识形态和叙事上将消费者构成为种族血统的遗传载体的方式。具体而言，我们分析了 2015 年至 2018 年在美国有线电视上播出的 17 个商业广告。我们认为 Ancestry® 构成了作为 DNA 客观先驱的主体，它们构成了同质遗传种族社区的基础，这掩盖了 DTC DNA 的科学限制以及将遗传学与祖先联系起来的社会文化后果。最终，这些广告中的言辞自相矛盾地为美国美国人提供了独特的资源——让他们感到与其他人不同，同时鼓励他们对某个更大的集体产生归属感。Ancestry® 利用象征性种族的吸引力，并延续了种族在生物学上毫无问题的想法，从而相应地启用和限制了身份识别。