Francois Bernier and the invention of racial classification

@article{citeulike:2874322, abstract = {The article discusses the first attempt at a racial classification of the world's population, framed by the seventeenth-century French traveller, physician and Gassendist philosopher Francois Bernier. His classification of humanity into races or `species' is in some respects a typically seventeenth-century anthropological essay; in other respects it anticipates the eighteenth-century genre of the natural history of mankind. Overall, it is best characterized as an intellectual experiment, a try-out of a new mode of discussing human variety. The historical significance of Bernier's discourse on race lies precisely in its transitional nature. Stuurman discusses Bernier's racial classification in the context of his own philosophical and ethnographic thought, then situates it in the larger intellectual transitions of the late seventeenth century. The idea of racial classification as the new foundation for a `division of the world' was ushered in by four factors, two negative and two positive. The negative factors were, first, the loss of intellectual credibility for sacred history as an explanatory framework for the history of humanity; and second, the impasse of Renaissance cosmography with its kaleidoscopic multiplication of ever more nations and tribes. The positive factors were, first, the empirical turn of Gassendist philosophy which partly bridged the gap between the biological and the mental, and also cleared the way for a synthesis between abstract, `theoretical' equality and a pragmatic, empiricist appreciation of differential rationality; and second, the new spirit of classification manifested in all areas of empirical inquiry from Bacon onwards, especially powerful in natural history during the closing decades of the seventeenth century. 10.1093/hwj/2000.50.1}, author = {Stuurman, Siep}, citeulike-article-id = {2874322}, doi = {10.1093/hwj/2000.50.1}, journal = {Hist Workshop J}, keywords = {history, race, science}, month = {September}, number = {50}, pages = {1--21}, posted-at = {2008-09-24 17:59:13}, priority = {2}, title = {Francois Bernier and the invention of racial classification}, url = {http://dx.doi.org/10.1093/hwj/2000.50.1}, volume = {2000}, year = {2000} }

TY - JOUR ID - citeulike:2874322 L3 - citeulike-article-id:2874322 N2 - The article discusses the first attempt at a racial classification of the world's population, framed by the seventeenth-century French traveller, physician and Gassendist philosopher Francois Bernier. His classification of humanity into races or `species' is in some respects a typically seventeenth-century anthropological essay; in other respects it anticipates the eighteenth-century genre of the natural history of mankind. Overall, it is best characterized as an intellectual experiment, a try-out of a new mode of discussing human variety. The historical significance of Bernier's discourse on race lies precisely in its transitional nature. Stuurman discusses Bernier's racial classification in the context of his own philosophical and ethnographic thought, then situates it in the larger intellectual transitions of the late seventeenth century. The idea of racial classification as the new foundation for a `division of the world' was ushered in by four factors, two negative and two positive. The negative factors were, first, the loss of intellectual credibility for sacred history as an explanatory framework for the history of humanity; and second, the impasse of Renaissance cosmography with its kaleidoscopic multiplication of ever more nations and tribes. The positive factors were, first, the empirical turn of Gassendist philosophy which partly bridged the gap between the biological and the mental, and also cleared the way for a synthesis between abstract, `theoretical' equality and a pragmatic, empiricist appreciation of differential rationality; and second, the new spirit of classification manifested in all areas of empirical inquiry from Bacon onwards, especially powerful in natural history during the closing decades of the seventeenth century. 10.1093/hwj/2000.50.1 IS - 50 JF - Hist Workshop J EP - 21 TI - Francois Bernier and the invention of racial classification VL - 2000 SP - 1 KW - history KW - race KW - science AU - Stuurman, Siep PY - 2000/09/01/ UR - http://dx.doi.org/10.1093/hwj/2000.50.1 ER -