Mixed Race Studies

Eugenics in Brazil: In the early 20th century, elites believed racial improvement was only possible with a project favoring predominance of the white race

Black Women of Brazil: The site dedicated to Brazilian women of African descent
2018-02-27

Tiago Ferreira, Staff
Vix

What was the eugenics movement in Brazil: so absurd that it is difficult to believe

Eugenia is a term that came from the Greek and means ‘well born’. “Eugenics emerged to validate hierarchical segregation,” Pietro Diwan, author of the book Raça Pura: uma história da eugenia no Brasil e no mundo (Pure Race: A History of Eugenics in Brazil and the World), explains to VIX.

How eugenics was born

The idea was disseminated by Francis Galton, responsible for creating the term, in 1883. He imagined that the concept of natural selection of Charles Darwin—who, by the way, was his cousin—also applied to humans.

His project was intended to prove that the intellectual capacity was hereditary, that is, it passed from member to member of the family and, thus, to justify the exclusion of the blacks, Asian immigrants and disabled of all the types…

Read the entire article here.

The Idea Of Race

Hackett Publishing Company
2000
256 pages
Cloth ISBN: 0-87220-459-6, ISBN-13: 978-0-87220-459-1
Paper ISBN: 0-87220-458-8, ISBN-13: 978-0-87220-458-4

Edited by

Robert Bernasconi, Edwin Erle Sparks Professor of Philosophy
Pennsylvania State University

Tommy L. Lott, Professor of Philosophy
San José State University

A survey of the historical development of the idea of race, this anthology offers pre-twentieth century theories about the concept of race, classic twentieth century sources reiterating and contesting ideas of race as scientific, and several philosophically relevant essays that discuss the issues presented. A general Introduction gives an overview of the readings. Headnotes introduce each selection. Includes suggested further readings.

Table of Contents
Introduction

The Classification of Races

1. Francois Bernier, “A new division of earth, according to the different species or races of men who inhabit it”
2. Francois-Marie Voltaire, “Of the Different Races of Men,” from The Philosophy of History
3. Immanuel Kant, “Of the Different Human Races”
4. Johann Gottfried von Herder, Ideas on the Philosophy of the History of Humankind
5. Johann Friedrich Blumenbach, On the Natural Variety of Mankind
6. G. W. F. Hegel, “Anthropology,” from The Encyclopedia of Philosophical Science

Science and Eugenics

1. Arthur de Gobineau, The Inequality of Human Races
2. Charles Darwin, “On the Races of Man,” from The Descent of Man
3. Francis Galton, “Eugenics: Its Definition, Scope and Aims”

Heredity and Culture

1. Franz Boas, “Instability of Human Types”
2. Alain Locke, “The Concept of Race as applied to Social Culture”
3. Ashley Montagu, “The Concept of Race in the Human Species in the Light of Genetics”

Race and Political Ideology

1. W. E. B. Du Bois, The Conservation of Races
2. Anthony Appiah, “The Uncompleted Argument: Du Bois and the Illusion of Race”
3. Leopold Senghor, “What is Negritude?”

Racial Identity

1. Linda Alcoff, “Mestizo Identity”
2. Michael Hanchard, “Black Cinderella? Race and the Public Sphere in Brazil”
3. Michael Omi and Howard Winant, Racial Formation in the United States.