Class-centered apartheid scholarship treated race’s relative autonomy as conceded but never analyzed.

Evidence

The focus on the relationship between apartheid and capitalism signaled the consensus that lay at the heart of the debate, that the key to understanding apartheid lay at the interface of political and economic processes. So the research generated by this debate tended to say little, if anything, about racist institutions and practices which seemed more remote from the capitalist nexus. Even if the “relative autonomy of race” was acknowledged (and at times, stressed), there was little interest or effort made to unpack it. — David Theo Goldberg, John Solomos, A Companion to Racial and Ethnic Studies, 571

Categorization

• XREF: This gap the neo-Marxist work left — race acknowledged as relatively autonomous yet unexamined — is precisely the opening Omi & Winant’s racial formation theory later fills. — connects to: Apartheid scholarship defined race negatively as whatever is not class, never positively. — David Theo Goldberg, John Solomos, A Companion to Racial and Ethnic Studies, 574; Apartheid historiography avoided defining race, treating it as residual or given — David Theo Goldberg, John Solomos, A Companion to Racial and Ethnic Studies, 574; South African academia neglected the study of race despite its omnipresence — David Theo Goldberg, John Solomos, A Companion to Racial and Ethnic Studies, 547 (+2 more)

Broader Connections

• Apartheid historiography avoided defining race, treating it as residual or given #corroborates (0.95) — David Theo Goldberg, John Solomos, A Companion to Racial and Ethnic Studies, 574
• Apartheid historiography sidestepped the theoretical question of what race actually is #corroborates (0.95)
• Apartheid scholarship defined race negatively as whatever is not class, never positively. #expands (0.90) — David Theo Goldberg, John Solomos, A Companion to Racial and Ethnic Studies, 574
• Little research has probed the social meanings of race under apartheid #corroborates (0.85) — David Theo Goldberg, John Solomos, A Companion to Racial and Ethnic Studies, 548
• South African academia neglected the study of race despite its omnipresence #corroborates (0.80) — David Theo Goldberg, John Solomos, A Companion to Racial and Ethnic Studies, 547