Racial naturalism redefined non-Europeans as biologically incapable of interbreeding

Evidence

To be sure, the racial Muslim was not a new project of racialization, but one that was expanded and amplified in the aftermath of 9/11. What needs to be emphasized is that races are produced by racism. There is no biological basis for race. Races are made and produced through practices of exploitation, expropriation, and exclusion. Race is therefore understood in this book as both ideology and practice rooted in the political economy of empire. Empire creates the condition for anti-Muslim racism, and Islamophobia sustains empire. — Deepa Kumar, Islamophobia and the Politics of Empire, 76 (#complicates, via linked claim)

The commission justified its license to expend funds, time, and personnel in part by redirecting the vectors of accountability and blame. Race, as one commissioner upheld, was no way to distinguish need in a modern world. But the virulent effects of racialized policy were present and effective. Race thrived as a vital political concept and accrued power in its updated form. It distinguished the cultural coordinates of those with the capacity to participate in the intimate and public practices of European privilege, even as it disenfranchised those who could not claim echte (real), zuivere (pure) full-blooded membership. — Ann Laura Stoler, Along the Archival Grain_ Epistemic…, 981 (#complicates, via linked claim)

Weare critical of both positions: race as essence and race as illusion. Race is not something rooted in nature, something that reflects clear and discrete variations in human identity. But race is also not an illusion. While it may not be “real” in a biological sense, race is indeed real as a social category with definite social consequences. The family, as a social concept, provides an intriguing analogy to grasp the “reality” of race: We know that families take many forms … Some family categories correspond to biological categories; others do not. — Michael Omi, Howard Winant, Racial Formation in the United States, 113 (#complicates, via linked claim)

Categorization

• XREF: connects to: Darwinism prepared but did not directly cause racial nativism — John Higham, Strangers in the Land: Patterns of…, 787; Race retained power by distinguishing cultural capacity for European privilege rather than biology — Ann Laura Stoler, Along the Archival Grain_ Epistemic…, 981; Ancient notions of race as biology do not match reality — David Theo Goldberg, John Solomos, A Companion to Racial and Ethnic Studies, 901 (+4 more)

Broader Connections

• Races are produced by racism, not by biology #complicates (0.80) — Deepa Kumar, Islamophobia and the Politics of Empire, 76
• Race retained power by distinguishing cultural capacity for European privilege rather than biology #complicates (0.78) — Ann Laura Stoler, Along the Archival Grain_ Epistemic…, 981
• Race is socially constructed rather than biologically real but has powerful social effects #complicates (0.76) — Michael Omi, Howard Winant, Racial Formation in the United States, 113
• Treating race as a fixed biological category replicates the racism it opposes #complicates (0.75)