As a South Asian women’s health researcher with reproductive health concerns and a family history shaped by similar conditions, my body feels inscribed with risk of infertility (typically defined as difficulty conceiving). This sense of risk is due to the fact that in biomedicine, ‘South Asian’ — a vague racial or ethnic variable — is considered to be a clinical risk factor across various reproductive health conditions and treatment pathways, such as in vitro fertilization (IVF).
However, reading the article by anthropologist Sandra Bärnreuther made me realize that biomedical knowledge practices do not simply reflect reality. Rather, they actively produce race as a clinical risk factor. That is, racialization is not a passive representation of demographic realities but a dynamic process that produces racial meaning through statistical techniques, inclusion criteria and research designs.