Race

This dynamic study of the history of the idea of race traces the concept from its prehistory across 400 years to its current status. Brian Niro introduces key theorists and philosophers and a wide variety of literary and theoretical concepts, taking the central view that the notion of race is a fluid concept that has altered consistently since its inception in Western ideology.

Starting with Greek philosophy, Niro moves effortlessly through such diverse writers as Shakespeare, Voltaire, Kant, Mary Shelly, Darwin, Fanon and Achebe in order to explore the representation of race in its various guises. Many contemporary discussions of race are intricate and limited in their scope to current doctrine, but by using a series of close readings of often-studied texts, Niro helps to demonstrate key ideas and make complex theories understandable.

General Editor's Preface.- Acknowledgements.- Introduction.- PART ONE: FALSE ORIGINS: THE GREEKS, METHODOLOGY, ETYMOLOGY AND SHAKESPEARE.- Theory, Practice and Origins.- The Greeks: Plato and Aristotle.- Methodology and Travel Writing.- Etymology and Shakespeare.- Transition.- PART TWO: THE ENLIGHTENMENT AND THE FABRICATION OF RACE.- The Enlightenment: Fabrication of Race.- Defoe and Racial Malleability.- Frankenstein's Imperial Paranoia.- Transition.- PART THREE: SCIENTIFIC AUTHORITY AND APPROPRIATION.- Charles Darwin.- Counter-narratives, Degeneration and Eugenics.- Kipling's Duality and Degenerative Subversion.- Transition.- PART FOUR: MODERNITY, ORIENTALISM, NEGRITUDE AND THE PHENOMENOLOGY OF RACE.- Modernism as Movement Toward the Postcolonial.- Orientalism.- Negritude.- Encounters with Racism: Achebe, Conrad and Kane.- Transition.- PART FIVE: AMERICA.- Placing Race: The One Drop Rule.- The Harlem Renaissance and Passing: Black Art and the Disappearing Trope of Race.- Cane and Passing.- The Impossibility of an American Race.- Transition: Conclusion, Introduction and Return.- Annotated Bibliography.- Bibliography.- Index.