Core Department Faculty Member

Dr. Rina Bliss is Associate Professor of Sociology at Rutgers University. She is an expert on the social significance of emerging genetic sciences and the award-winning author Rethinking Intelligence (HarperCollins), Race Decoded (Stanford University Press) and Social by Nature (Stanford University Press), as well as the forthcoming What’s Real About Race? Untangling Science, Genetics, and Society (W.W. Norton, 2025). She is a member of the Human Genome Synthesis Project, an affiliate of UCSF and the UC Berkeley Center for Social Medicine, and a consultant to public institutions like the National Academies of Science, Engineering and Medicine, the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, and PBS’s Finding Your Roots.

With a drive to sequence people for genetic markers associated with IQ, cutting-edge research into how our genes respond to our environments shows us that hacking our DNA might not actually boost our brains. In Rethinking Intelligence: A Radical New Understanding of Our Human Potential, Dr. Bliss explores what we should know about the new science of intelligence and how best to use that knowledge to nurture your intelligence, whether it be in the workplace, in our education systems, or at home.

In What’s Real About Race? Untangling Science, Genetics, and Society, Dr. Bliss shares a myth-busting exploration of human diversity and genetics proving that race isn’t genetic but it is nonetheless real. Dr. Bliss shows how the misnomers, fictions, and lies we tell ourselves deeply impact almost every part of our lives. She provides a vision for how we as a society can counteract harmful stereotypes and injustices to move beyond the misconception toward a more equitable way of life.

Dr. Bliss speaks to audiences all over the world about the politics of health, technology, education, and equality, presenting at organizations such as the EU European Molecular Biology Lab, National Academies of Science, Engineering, and Medicine, National Institutes of Health, and National Human Genome Research Institute. Her research has been featured in The New York Times, NPR, ABC News, and in international news outlets like East Asia Daily, German Public Broadcasting, and La Presse.

Dr. Bliss holds a PhD in Sociology from the New School for Social Research, has held Postdoctoral Fellowships at Brown University BioMed and the Cogut Center for the Humanities and Social Sciences, and has received grants and fellowships from the Andrew Mellon Foundation and the National Science Foundation, among others.