“A deeply researched, well-referenced history of the definition and application of heredity from a cultural perspective, covering the earliest ideas through modern genomic application. . . . This work will have broad appeal for students studying biology, ethics, science history, and potentially, law. Recommended.”

D. L. Beach, Longwood University | Choice

“[A]n essential resource for those interested in the study of heredity—in any time period or disciplinary tradition, from seventeenth-century studies of generation to contemporary work on the ethics of genetically modified organisms or human cloning. Müller-Wille and Rheinberger’s contribution thus serves as a valuable addition to our existing histories of generation, heredity, and genetics.”

Charles H. Pence, University of Notre Dame | HOPOS

"Big-picture synthetic histories have a deserved reputation for being worthy but dull. A Cultural History of Heredity has escaped that fate entirely. From start to finish, this is history as argument, marshalling an astonishing amount of material in the service of a single and, even in this sophisticated form, simple thesis. Everyone interested in the long run of ‘heredity’--a word that indeed had no meaningful life in English until the likes of Herbert Spencer and Francis Galton gave it currency, adapting recent French usage--should be grateful to have had so much information and insight pulled together into such an economical (in both senses) package."

Gregory Radick | British Journal for the History of Science

"In the best sense of the word this book is a distillation--of a difficult and unintuitive concept, of a complex historiography, and of a rich methodology. . . . For those who wish for a book that would quickly, dynamically, and authentically take them into the richest and most exciting area of a large body of scholarship, this book does this and does it with style. The result is an eminently enjoyable read."

Myrna Perez Sheldon | Endeavour

“This thought-provoking analysis of the changing cultural position of heredity will be as enjoyable as it is challenging to readers. It includes a substantial and very full bibliography that should provide any avid historian of genetics with an abundance of background reading. Although a historian of science is the obvious audience for this work, any scientist interested in genetics will find this an enlightening look at the history of this field.”

Quarterly Review of Biology

“A Cultural History of Heredity is an enormously interesting and persuasive book that will speak not only to historians of science but also to biologists and general social and intellectual historians interested in the interface between the nitty-gritty of biology and the backdrop of social and cultural affairs.”

Frederick B. Churchill, Indiana University

“Staffan Müller-Wille and Hans-Jörg Rheinberger masterfully delineate the evolution of the concept of heredity since the late eighteenth century, its transformation from the cultural metaphors of gardens and families to the biological tools of genetic engineering and the genome. Breathtaking in scope, their book ranges across multiple national boundaries and illuminates how ideas of heredity were—and continue to be—shaped by forces of culture, law, medicine, technology, and markets. In all, a compelling and original synthesis of a vast body of primary sources and recent scholarship.”

Daniel J. Kevles, Yale University

“In this original and insightful book Staffan Müller-Wille and Hans-Jörg Rheinberger do not take the concept of heredity for granted. Rather they offer an account of the rise of the epistemic space in which heredity took shape as a biological concept and moved to the forefront of biological research. Deeply informed and covering much ground, the book is certain to provide rich food for thought and stimulate further investigation.”

Soraya de Chadarevian, University of California, Los Angeles