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The historical definition of race was an immutable and distinct type or species, sharing distinct racial characteristics such as constitution, temperament, and mental abilities. These races were not conceived as being related with each other, but formed a hierarchy of inherent value called the Great Chain of Being with Europeans usually at the top. As time progressed, Darwin's theory of evolution was applied to races. By this time, anthropologists considered humans to be related to each other. The word "race," interpreted to mean common descent, was introduced into English in about 1580, from the Old French rasse (1512), from Italian razza, which may have been derived from the Latin word generatio (a begetting). The etymology can be further traced back to Latin gens (clan, stock, people) and genus (birth, descent, origin, race, stock, family) which in turn comes from the Greek γένος (race, stock, or family). Image File history File links Broom_icon. ...
For other uses, see Race (disambiguation). ...
For other uses, see Species (disambiguation). ...
1579 drawing of the great chain of being from Didacus Valades, Rhetorica Christiana The great chain of being or scala naturæ is a classical and western medieval conception of the order of the universe, whose chief characteristic is a strict hierarchical system. ...
A group of organisms is said to have common descent if they have a common ancestor. ...
The English language is a West Germanic language that originates in England. ...
This late origin for the English and French terms is consistent with the thesis that the concept of "race" as defining a very small number of groups of human beings based on lineage dates from the time of Columbus. Older concepts that were also at least partly based on common descent, such as nation and tribe, entail a much larger number of groupings. Christopher Columbus (1451 – May 20, 1506) was a navigator and colonialist who is one of the first Europeans to discover the Americas, after the Vikings. ...
For other uses, see Nation (disambiguation). ...
http://www. ...
Earliest racial theories The earliest racial theory was made by the historian of the 3rd century Han Dynasty to distinguish barbarians of blonde hair and green eyes "who resemble the monkeys from which they are descended."[1](Gossett, pp. 4) When the lighter ancient Egyptians were in power they called the darker group the "the evil race of Ish" while when the darker ancient Egyptians were in power they called the lighter group the "the pale, degraded race of Arvad". [1] Greek Hippocrates in 5th century BCE considered racial temperament to be the product of the environment, (Gossett, pp. 6).[1] He considered Greeks to be warlike and brave because they lived in a barren soil, (Gossett, pp. 6).[1] On the other hand, the Asians were weak and peaceful because they lived in a luscious vegetation, (Gossett, pp. 6).[1] Aristotle, a Greek, distinguished his race as the Hellenic race which had both spirit, the ability to govern and intelligence whereas Europeans had spirit but lacked intelligence and the ability to govern due to the cold climate, (Gossett, pp. 6).[1] He considered the Asians to be intelligent but lack spirit and be in a constant state of slavery, (Gossett, pp. 6). [1] A Native North American racial theory in the form of a legend held that American Indians were superior to blacks and whites, (Gossett, pp. 7). [1] The legend said that in God's first attempt to make a human he cooked him too long, making blacks, (Gosett, pp. 7). [1] In God's second attempt, he didn't cook them enough, making whites, (Gossett, pp. 7). [1] In God's third attempt he realized the golden brown perfection of the American Indian, (Gossett, pp. 7). [1]
17th century theories of racial difference While the 17th century did not have systematic notions of racial difference, colonialism led to the development of social and political institutions, such as slavery in the New World, that were later justified through racial theories (cf. Gossett 1997:17). It has been suggested that Benign colonialism be merged into this article or section. ...
Slave redirects here. ...
Frontispiece of Peter Martyr dAnghieras De orbe novo (On the New World). Carte dAmérique, Guillaume Delisle, 1722. ...
In a series of lectures, Society Must be Defended (1975-76), Michel Foucault proposed that the ""historical and political discourse"" of race struggle can be traced to the "Revolution of 1688" and the end of Louis XIV's reign. According to him, this was one of the first examples of popular history (of the "race"), opposed to a history of the sovereign. The significance of this, for Foucault, was that "race struggle" functioned as a counter-history to the history of the sovereign. The strength of the nation or race supplanted the histories of the strength of the ruler. So, for example, in Great Britain, a history of the Saxon people was used by Edward Coke and John Lilburn against the absolute rule of William. William's power was curbed because a history of Saxon laws were discovered and said to be the laws of nature, the laws of the race and hence the laws. It should be noted that Foucault makes the distinction between race struggle and state racism or racism in general. For Focault, "racism" does not appear until the 19th Century. Michel Foucault (IPA pronunciation: ) (October 15, 1926 – June 25, 1984) was a French philosopher and historian. ...
Philosophy of History is an area of philosophy concerning the eventual significance, if any, of human history. ...
The Glorious Revolution (1688-1689), also known as the bloodless revolution, is an event in which the Stuart king James II (James VII of Scotland) was removed from his thrones of England, Scotland and Ireland, and replaced by William of the House of Orange and his wife and joint sovereign...
Louis XIV King of France and Navarre By Hyacinthe Rigaud (1701) Louis XIV (Louis-Dieudonné) (September 5, 1638–September 1, 1715) reigned as King of France and King of Navarre from May 14, 1643 until his death. ...
Sir Edward Coke Sir Edward Coke (pronounced cook) (1 February 1552 – 3 September 1634), was an early English colonial entrepreneur and jurist whose writings on the English common law were the definitive legal texts for some 300 years. ...
François Bernier The first comprehensive classification of humans into distinct races is believed to be François Bernier's Nouvelle division de la terre par les différents espèces ou races qui l'habitent ("New division of Earth by the different species or races which inhabit it"), published in 1684 (Gossett, 1997:32-33). Bernier distinguished four races: Far Easterners, Europeans, blacks and Lapps, (Gossett, p. 32)[1] . He was unsure which of his four races American Indians belonged to, (Gossett, p. 32)[1] François Bernier (1625 – 1688) was a French physician and traveler, born at Joué-Etiau /Anjou. ...
Events France under Louis XIV makes Truce of Ratisbon separately with the Empire and Spain. ...
18th century
Christoph Meiners German anthropologist Christoph Meiners devised a "binary racial scheme" of "two races" with the Caucasian whose racial purity was exemplified by the "venerated... ancient Germans" with some Europeans being impure "dirty whites" and "Mongolians" who consisted of everyone else.[2] He characterized Caucasians as having "lightness" and "beauty" with the "whitest, most blooming and most delicate skin". On the other hand, he characterized Mongolians as being "weak in body and spirit, bad, and lacking virtue"[2]
George Buffon George Louis Leclerc Buffon was a natural historian whose work was published between 1749 and 1804, (Gossett, p. 35).[1] Johann Blumenbach characterized Buffon's racial classification scheme when he wrote, "Buffon distinguished six varieties of man:(1) Lapp or polar, (2) Tatar (by which name according to ordinary language he meant the Mongolian), (3) south Asian, (4) European, (5) Ethiopian, (6) American"[3] He believed that whites were normative while other races were "arbitrary operations of our own fancy (subjectivity)" whose forms were induced through a temporary process of custom, climate, or diet, (Gossett, p. 36).[1] He thought blacks were black because they were subjected to the Sun's rays, (Gossett, p. 36).[1] He thought Greenlanders and Laplanders were dark due to extreme cold, (Gossett, p. 36).[1] He believed that any people would turn into the normative white people if subjected by the same conditions whites live in, (Gossett, p. 36).[1]
Gottfried Leibniz Gottfried Leibniz believed that regardless of the differences in culture and appearance in humans that all humans belonged to the same race, (Gossett, p. 34).[1] He found "no reason" that he would have to accept the idea of humans belonging to separate races, (Gossett, p. 34).[1] "The absolute lowest species is an individual," remarked Leibniz on the proposition of separate races.[4] “Leibniz†redirects here. ...
Carolus Linnaeus Carlous Linneaus distinguished between "species" and "varieties" with the former being separate thoughts of the "Infinite Being", (Gossett, p. 35).[1] He considered human races to be "varieties" which he tagged with a binomial nomenclature: Homo Europaeus, Homo Asiaticus, Homo Afer and Homo Americanus, (Gossett, p. 35).[1]
Friedrich Blumenbach On the basis of his craniometrical research analysis Blumenbach divided the humans into five races although he admitted that craniometric variables of different populations overlap, making any distinct classification impossible.(Gossett, p. 37).[1] His races were the "Caucasian" or white, "Mongolian" or yellow (East Asians), the "Malayan" or brown race (Southeast Asians), "Ethiopian" or black race and the "American" or red race (Native Americans). He considered all races to be equal in intellect, (Gossett, p. 39).[1] He considered physical variation to be caused by climate although he couldn't decide the exact mechanism for the change, (Gossett, p. 38).[1] He laid out the tiers of the "racial hierarchy" in his book On the Natural Variety of Mankind in a descending order of value: whites, yellows, browns, reds and blacks.[2] For the peoples actually from the Caucasus, see Peoples of the Caucasus. ...
He characterized the racial classification scheme of Metzger when he wrote, "Metzger makes two principal varieties as extremes:(1) the white man native of Europe, of the northern parts of Asia, America and Africa; (2) the black, or Ethiopian, of the rest of Africa. The transition between the two is made by the rest of the Asiatics, the inhabitants of South America and the Islanders of the southern ocean"[3]
Regarding the classification scheme of Klügel he wrote, "Klügel distinguishes four stocks: (1) the primitive autochtones of that elevated Asiatic plain ["Scythio-Asiatic plain"] we were speaking of, from which he derives the inhabitants of the rest of Asia, the whole of Europe, the extreme north of America, northern Africa; (2) the Negroes; (3) the Americans, except those of the extreme north of America; (4) the islanders of the southern ocean."[3] Approximate extent of Scythia and Sarmatia in the 1st century BC (the orange background shows the spread of Eastern Iranian languages, among them Scytho-Sarmatian). ...
Blumenbach characterized the racial classification scheme of John Hunter when he wrote, "John Hunter reckons seven varieties: (1) of black men, that is, of Ethiopians, Papuans, &e.; (2) the blackish inhabitants of Mauritania and the Cape of Good Hope; (3) the copper-coloured of eastern India; (4) the red Americans; (5) the tawny, as Tartars, Arabs, Persians and Chinese, &e. (6) brownish as the southern Europeans, Spaniards &e., Turks, Abyssinians, Samoiedes and Lapps; (7) white, as the remaining Europeans, the Georgians, Mingrelians and Kabardinski"[3]
Samuel Smith Samuel Stanhope Smith in 1787 wrote that racial differences were caused by climate and that everyone was essentially the same race, (Gossett, p. 39).[1]. He believed that skin color eventually became innate after prolonged exposure to the sun, (Gossett, p. 39).[1]. Where sunlight couldn't explain skin color by itself, he concluded elevation, wind, water and earth may influence skin color, (Gossett, p. 40).[1]. He thought that facial features of non-whites would eventually look white under prolonged exposure to civilization, (Gossett, p. 40).[1]. He concluded that there were multivariable human traits which overlap, making it futile and impossible to classify distinct races,(Gossett, p. 40).[1].
Benjamin Rush Benjamin Rush, a notable scientist of his time period, believed that all races were equal, (Gossett, p. 41).[1]. He believed non-whites were really white underneath but they were stricken with a non-contagious form of leprosy which darkened their skin color, (Gossett, p. 41).[1].
Lord Kames Lord Kames in 1774 believed that "each race is a separate species", citing evidence where separate species have successfully mated, (Gossett, p. 45).[1]. He believed that environmental factors had no influence on human variation, (Gossett, p. 45)[1]. As an example, he compared the big heads, ugliness, and squate frame of Eskimos with the handsome and tall stature of Norwegians both living in extreme cold, (Gossett, p. 45).[1]. He believed mental characteristics of races had a "permanent and invariable cause", (Gossett, p. 46).[1]. He cites the Bible as evidence for God creating separate races at the time of the Tower of Babel, (Gossett, p. 47).[1]. | “ | By confounding the language of men, and scattering them abroad upon the face of the earth, they were rendered savages. And to harden them for their new habitations, it was necessary that they should be divided into different kinds, fitted for different climates. With an immediate change in bodily constitutions, the builders of Babel could not possibly have subsisted in the burning region of Guinea, or in the frozen region of Lapland; especially without houses, or any other convenience to protect them against a destructive climate. | ” |
Charles White In 1799, Charles White, a physician and surgeon, identified all life forms as occupying different stations on a Great Chain of Beings, but he was not an evolutionist, (Gossett, p. 47)[1]. He believed that races occupied different stations in the Great Chain of Being and he tried to prove with science that human races have distinct origins from each other,(Gossett, p. 47)[1]. He believed that whites and "Negroes" were two different species that were incapable of producing fertile offspring, (Gossett, p. 49)[1]. Since he believed that they were half way between whites and apes in the Great Chain of Being and he maintains that in Africa apes and blacks mate with each other with the apes holding black women as "objects of brutal passion", (Gossett, p. 49)[1]. He claims that there is a slippery slope involved in defining blacks to be the same species as whites, because there would be no reason why apes should not be considered the same species as whites, (Gossett, p. 50)[1]. In debate or rhetoric, the slippery slope is an argument for the likelihood of one event or trend given another. ...
| “ | In whatever respect the African differs from the European, the particularity brings him nearer to the ape,(Gossett, p. 49)[1]. | ” |
Immanuel Kant In the 1770's, Immanuel "Kant derives four varieties of dark-brown autochthones: the white one of northern Europe, the copper-coloured American, the black one of Senegambia, the olive-colored Indian." [3] He subscribed to the thoery of "hybridization, or the invariable inheritance by offspring of the differing characteristics of both parents...", but had difficulty reconciling it with the vast variety of physical traits in the human species.[4] He rejected the multiple origin hypothesis of the human species because humans could interbreed and produce fertile offspring with each other.[4] This made him arrive at the conclusion that human "parents descend from common, original stock in which different, invariably inherited characteristics subsequently developed."[4] Race, for Kant, was principally an "a priori" observation of the "hybrid" nature of humans. [4]
19th century Among the 19th-century naturalists who defined the field were Georges Cuvier, James Cowles Pritchard, Louis Agassiz, Charles Pickering (Races of Man and Their Geographical Distribution, 1848). Cuvier enumerated three races, Pritchard seven, Agassiz twelve, and Pickering eleven. Georges Cuvier Baron Georges Léopold Chrétien Frédéric Dagobert Cuvier (August 23, 1769–May 13, 1832) was a French naturalist and zoologist. ...
James Cowles Prichard (February 11, 1786 - December 23, 1848), English physician and ethnologist, was born at Ross in Herefordshire. ...
Louis Agassiz After the 1906 San Francisco earthquake, Stanford President David Starr Jordan wrote, Somebody—Dr. Angell, perhaps—remarked that Agassiz was great in the abstract but not in the concrete. ...
Charles Pickering (November 10, 1805 _ March 17, 1878) was an American naturalist. ...
Year 1848 (MDCCCXLVIII) was a leap year starting on Saturday (link will display the full calendar) of the Gregorian Calendar (or a leap year starting on Monday of the 12-day slower Julian calendar). ...
Louis Agassiz's Racial Definitions
Thomas Huxley's Racial Definitions Thomas Huxley wrote one paper, On the Geographical Distribution of the Chief Modifications of Mankind (1870), in which he proposed a distinction within the human species, 'races', and their distribution across the earth. Huxley's paper was rejected by the Royal Society and this became one of the many theories to be advanced and dropped by the early exponent of evolution. Despite rejection by Huxley and the science community, the paper is sometimes cited in support of racialism.[5] (see also:) Thomas Henry Huxley, FRS (4 May 1825 – 29 June 1895) [1] was an English biologist, known as Darwins Bulldog for his advocacy of Charles Darwins theory of evolution. ...
For other uses, see Royal Society (disambiguation). ...
This article is about evolution in biology. ...
Thomas Henry Huxley, FRS (4 May 1825 – 29 June 1895) [1] was an English biologist, known as Darwins Bulldog for his advocacy of Charles Darwins theory of evolution. ...
Joseph Arthur Comte de Gobineau
20th Century racialialists
Carleton Coon's Racial Definitions The 20th century racial classification by American anthropologist Carleton S. Coon, divided humanity into five races: Carleton Stevens Coon, (23 June 1904 – 3 June 1981) was an American physical anthropologist best remembered for his books on race. ...
Coon assigned even some populations on sub-Saharan Africa to a broadly defined Caucasoid race, leading to charges that peoples with recorded ancient civilizations were being defined out of the black race, in order to depict the remaining "Congoid" race as lacking in culture.
Coon and his work were widely accused, even at the time, of obsolete thinking or outright racism, but some of his terminology continues in use to a lesser degree even today, even though the "-oid" terms now have negative connotations.[6] This box: Racism has many definitions, the most common and widely accepted is that members of one race are intrinsically superior or inferior to members of other races. ...
See The Races of Europe, for further information. The Races of Europe is the title of two books related to the anthropology of Europeans. ...
J.D. Clark map of African distribution Africans were of many different types, shapes and colors, and extended from South Africa to the tips of northern Africa. Development was from a single species according to the multiregional hypothesis of evolution combining Homo erectus, Neanderthals, Homo Sapiens and other humans. These changed over time from a generalized African or Africoid type, due to interbreeding, replacement, genetic drift and other vehicles of evolution, into the dominant Homo Sapiens of today. To meet Wikipedias quality standards, this article or section may require cleanup. ...
Criticism of the biological significance of the notion of "race" Criticism of the new biological significance of race often accompanied the development of racial theories. In Society Must Be Defended (1978-79), Michel Foucault showed how, from a historical and political discourse of "race struggle", the notion of "race" was discussed in scientific terms in the 19th century by racist biologists and eugenicists. Psychoanalysis, he argues, was instrumental in opposing this dangerous form of essentialism, which would lead eventually to the Nazi "state racism". Michel Foucault (IPA pronunciation: ) (October 15, 1926 – June 25, 1984) was a French philosopher and historian. ...
Philosophy of History is an area of philosophy concerning the eventual significance, if any, of human history. ...
This box: Racism has many definitions, the most common and widely accepted is that members of one race are intrinsically superior or inferior to members of other races. ...
Eugenics is the self-direction of human evolution: Logo from the Second International Congress of Eugenics, 1921, depicting it as a tree which unites a variety of different fields. ...
pychoanalysis today comprises several interlocking theories concerning the functioning of the mind; the term also refers to a specific type of treatment where the analyst, upon hearing the thoughts of the analysand (analytic patient), formulates and then explains the unconscious bases for the patients symptoms and character problems. ...
In philosophy, essentialism is the view, that, for any specific kind of entity it is at least theoretically possible to specify a finite list of characteristics —all of which any entity must have to belong to the group defined. ...
Nazism in history Nazi ideology Nazism and race Outside Germany Related subjects Lists Politics Portal Nazism, or National Socialism (German: Nationalsozialismus), refers primarily to the totalitarian ideology and practices of the Nazi Party (National Socialist German Workers Party, German: Nationalsozialistische Deutsche Arbeiterpartei or NSDAP) under Adolf Hitler. ...
State racism is a concept used by French philosopher Michel Foucault to designate the reappropriation of the historical and political discourse of race struggle, In the late seventeenth century. ...
Many significant criticisms also came from the school of Franz Boas beginning in the 1920s. During the mid-1930s, with the rise of Nazi Germany and its prominent espousing of racist ideologies, there was an outpouring of popular works by scientists criticizing the use of race to justify the politics of "superiority" and "inferiority". An influential work in this regard was the publication of We Europeans: A Survey of "Racial" Problems by Julian Huxley and A. C. Haddon in 1935, which sought to show that population genetics allowed for only a highly limited definition of race at best. Another popular work during this period, "The Races of Mankind" by Ruth Benedict and Gene Weltfish, argued that though there were some racial differences, they were primarily superficial, and in any case did not justify political action. Claude Lévi-Strauss' Race and History (UNESCO, 1952) was another milestone in the critique of the biological "race" notion, arguing in favor of cultural relativism through the famous metaphor of cultures as different trains crossing each others in various directions and speed, thus each one seeming to progress to himself while others supposedly kept immobile. The question of whether "race" was at all a useful scientific concept has been in continuous debate since that time, becoming especially politicized during and after the Civil Rights Movement of the 1960s. Franz Boas Franz Boas (July 9, 1858 – December 21, 1942[1]) was one of the pioneers of modern anthropology and is often called the Father of American Anthropology. Born in Germany, Boas worked for most of his life in North America. ...
Nazi Germany, or the Third Reich, commonly refers to Germany in the years 1933–1945, when it was under the firm control of the totalitarian and fascist ideology of the Nazi Party, with the Führer Adolf Hitler as dictator. ...
This box: Racism has many definitions, the most common and widely accepted is that members of one race are intrinsically superior or inferior to members of other races. ...
Sir Julian Sorell Huxley, FRS (June 22, 1887 – February 14, 1975) was a English biologist, author, Humanist and internationalist, known for his popularisations of science in books and lectures. ...
Alfred Cort Haddon (May 24, 1855-April 20, 1940) was an influential British anthropologist. ...
1935 (MCMXXXV) was a common year starting on Tuesday (link will display full calendar). ...
Population genetics is the study of the distribution of and change in allele frequencies under the influence of the four evolutionary forces: natural selection, genetic drift, mutation, and migration. ...
To meet Wikipedias quality standards, this article or section may require cleanup. ...
This article is about the anthropologist. ...
UNESCO (United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization) is a specialized agency of the United Nations established in 1945. ...
A critic (derived from the ancient Greek word krites meaning a judge) is a person who offers a value judgement or an interpretation. ...
Cultural relativism is the principle that beliefs and activities should be interpreted in terms of his or her own culture. ...
Historically, various popular movements struggling for social justice and democratic rights since the Second World War were known as civil rights movement, most famously the American civil rights movement of the 1950s and 1960s, which struggled for equal rights for African-Americans. ...
References Footnotes
Bibliography - Augstein, Hannah Franziska, ed. Race: The Origins of an Idea, 1760-1850. Bristol, England: Thoemmes Press, 1996. ISBN 1-85506-454-5
- Dain, Bruce R. A Hideous Monster of the Mind: American Race Theory in the Early Republic. Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 2002. ISBN 0-674-00946-0
- Banton, Michael P. Racial Theories. 2nd ed. Cambridge & New York: Cambridge University Press, 1998. ISBN 0-521-33456-X
- Bowcock AM, Kidd JR, Mountain JL, Hebert JM, Carotenuto L, Kidd KK, Cavalli-Sforza LL "Drift, admixture, and selection in human evolution: a study with DNA polymorphisms." Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A 1991; 88: 3: 839-43
- A. M. Bowcock, High resolution of human evolutionary trees with polymorphic microsatellites, 1994, Nature, 368: pp.455-457
- Foucault, Michel. Society Must Be Defended: Lectures at the Collège De France, 1975-76. Trans. David Macey. Eds. Mauro Bertani and Alessandro Fontana. City: Picador, 2003. ISBN 0-312-20318-7
- Gossett, Thomas F.. Race: The History of an Idea in America. 1963. Ed. and with a foreword by Shelley Fisher Fishkin and Arnold Rampersad. Oxford, England: Oxford UP, 1997. ISBN 0-19-509778-5
- Gould, Stephen Jay. The Mismeasure of Man. Rev. and expand ed. New York: Norton, 1996. ISBN 0-393-03972-2
- Hannaford, Ivan. Race: The History of an Idea in the West. Washington, D.C.: Woodrow Wilson Center Press, 1996. ISBN 0-8018-5222-6
- Rick Kittles, and S. O. Y. Keita, "Interpreting African Genetic Diversity", African Archaeological Review, Vol. 16, No. 2,1999, p. 1-5
- Shipman, Pat. The Evolution of Racism: Human Differences and the Use and Abuse of Science. 1994. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2002. ISBN 0-674-00862-6
See also An ancestry-informative marker (AIM) is a gene, generally of humans, which have several polymorphisms that exhibit substantially different frequencies between races. ...
This article is about the anthropologist. ...
This article does not cite its references or sources. ...
A Nazi illustration of the perceived Nordic master race. ...
Physical anthropology, often called biological anthropology, studies the mechanisms of biological evolution, genetic inheritance, human adaptability and variation, primatology, primate morphology, and the fossil record of human evolution. ...
For other uses, see Race (disambiguation). ...
This article or section does not adequately cite its references or sources. ...
Scientific racism is a term that describes either obsolete scientific theories of the 19th century or historical and contemporary racist propaganda disguised as scientific research. ...
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