Lee D. Baker explores what racial categories mean to the American public and how these meanings are reinforced by anthropology, popular culture, and the law. Focusing on the period between two landmark Supreme Court decisions—Plessy v. Ferguson (the so-called "separate but equal" doctrine established in 1896) and Brown v. Board of Education (the public school desegregation decision of 1954)—Baker shows how racial categories change over time.
Baker paints a vivid picture of the relationships between specific African American and white scholars, who orchestrated a paradigm shift within the social sciences from ideas based on Social Darwinism to those based on cultural relativism. He demonstrates that the greatest impact on the way the law codifies racial differences has been made by organizations such as the NAACP, which skillfully appropriated the new social science to exploit the politics of the Cold War.
From Savage to Negro Anthropology and the Construction of Race, 1896-1954
About the Book
Reviews
"Through its interrogation of anthropological and political discourses about race and racial formation, From Savage to Negro topples historical myths about the nation's legacy of state-sanctioned segregation and racial difference."—Nation
"From Savage to Negro is more than a historic academic discourse on race and anthropology. It is truly a remarkable elucidation of the construction of race in anthropology and its influence in American politics and must be read."—Black Scholar: Journal of Black Studies and Research
". . . an innovative examination of the 50-year period between Plessy v. Ferguson (1896) and Brown v. Board of Education (1954), during which "ideas about racial inferiority were supplanted by notions of racial equality" in law, science, and public opinion."—Social Forces
"With care and precision, Baker shows how by the mid-20th century, African American intellectuals and leaders selectively appropriated anthropology—specifically, the work of Franz Boas—in their efforts to affirm notions of racial equality. Thus, From Savage to Negro documents the paradoxically liberating and normalizing potentiality of anthropological thought."—History of Anthropology Review
"In direct and pointed contrast to recent efforts to minimize or obscure the significance of race as a factor in social life, Baker argues for renewed emphasis on its ubiquitous social reach and power."—Waldo Martin, author of The Mind of Frederick Douglass
Read More >
Table of Contents
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
Introduction
Chapter 1
History and Theory of a Racialized Worldview
Chapter 2
The Ascension of Anthropology as Social Darwinism
Chapter 3
Anthropology in American Popular Culture
Chapter 4
Progressive-Era Reform: Holding on to Hierarchy
Chapter 5
Rethinking Race at the Turn of the Century:
W.E.B. Du Bois and Franz Boas
Chapter 6
The New Negro and Cultural Politics of Race
Chapter 7
Looking behind the Veil with the Spy Glass
of Anthropology