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Our Mission

The Program on Race, Science and Society (PRSS) is an initiative at the University of Pennslyvania devoted to transformative and interdisciplinary approaches to the role of race in scientific research and biotechnological innovations, aiming both to promote social justice and to dispel the myth that race is a natural division of human beings.

PRSS Videos

PRSS Director Dorothy Roberts discusses the history, myths, and harms of race-based medicine in herTEDTalk: The Problem with Race-based Medicine, November 20, 2015. The talk was part of the 2015 TEDMED session called “Who Cares for Health Care?” that highlighted surprising perspectives and under-appreciated challenges facing our health care system. 

Penn Medicine and The Afterlives of Slavery Project

Given that Penn Medical School was the first of its kind in colonial America, the University of Pennslyvania has a special responsibility to not only uncover its relationship to enslavement but to lead other institutions in similar efforts.