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Globalizing Biology Globalizing Biology 8.22 Lecture - LPS 60 Summary of Today’s Lecture: Throughout the 1800s, many Western scientists constructed theories of biological race that encoded the belief that Europeans were naturally superior to all other people groups. These theories were used to justify enslavement, colonization, and imprisonment of “the vulgar”. Summary of Today’s Lecture: Throughout the 1800s, many Western scientists constructed theories of biological race that encoded the belief that Europeans were naturally superior to all other people groups. These theories were used to justify enslavement, colonization, and imprisonment of “the vulgar”. What are some of the biological features that the scientists in your reading focused on? Skull-based Non-skull-based Skull-based scientific racism 1. Phrenology 2. Brain size 3. Facial Angle Theories 4. Cephalic Index Skull-based scientific racism 1. Phrenology 2. Brain size 3. Facial Angle Theories 4. Cephalic Index British Sri Lanka 1640-1796: Dutch colonial rule 1802-1948: British colonial rule Linguistic demographics: 75% Sinhalese language 25% Tamil language Sri Lanka c.1520 Keppetipola Military leader of Sinhalese people in the Kingdom of Kandy during the Uva Rebellion of 1818 against the British colonial powers in Sri Lanka. He was executed in 1818 His skull was sent to the Edinburgh Phrenological Society. What is phrenology? Keppetipola Phrenology Argued that we could read off the mental capacities of a human by looking at bumps on their skull. ➢ Gall (1819) - Anatomy & Physiology of Nervous System ➢ Spurzheim (1827) - Outlines of Phrenology ➢ Combe (1828) - Constitution of Man Spurzheim’s Brain Areas (1827) 1. The Reproductive Instinct 11. Memory, educational ability 2. Parental Love 12. Locality: Sense of place 3. Friendship 13. Form: Understanding of shapes 4. Combativeness 14. Reverence: adoration of God 5. Destruction 15. Hope 6. Guile: the desire to keep secrets … 7. Acquisition: covetousness And 22 others 8. Self-Esteem, also arrogance 9. The need to be accepted by others 10. Caution Phrenology 1798: Franz Gall, physician to the Holy Roman Emperor in Austria, proposes cerebrally localized mental faculties. Visiting asylums and prisons in Austria, he generalizes to the faculties of murder and theft. 1805: Starts his lecture circuit throughout central Europe Gall lecturing in Berlin (1805) Phrenology 1798: Franz Gall, physician to the Holy Roman Emperor in Austria, proposes cerebrally localized mental faculties. Visiting asylums and prisons in Austria, he generalizes to the faculties of murder and theft. 1805: Starts his lecture circuit throughout central Europe Gall’s lecture circuit “The craniology of Dr. Gall was the favourite topic of the German literati during the summer of 1805 at almost every university and capital of the Northern Provinces of Germany. ...He there met with universal acceptance. The King, the Queen, princes and princesses, interested themselves so much in his discoveries that he obtained an invitation to go through a course of lectures in presence of the Royal Family, during which the Queen inspected the dissection of a human brain... Dr. Gall visited the houses of correction and prisons in Berlin and Spandau, and gave the most convincing proofs of his ability to discover, at first sight, such malefactors, thieves, and men of particular talents as were amongst the convicts and prisoners.” - The Edinburgh Medical and Surgical Journal (1806) Crime Leading Italian Phrenologist, Luigi Ferrarese, encouraged governments to embrace phrenology as a science that could help them solve many ‘social ills’ in his: Memorie Risguardanti La Dottrina Frenologica (1836) Popularization & Institutionalization In 1820, George Combe founded the Edinburgh Phrenological Society. George Combe’s Constitution of Man (1828) sold 350,000 copies between 1828 and 1900. (compare: Darwin's Origin of Species (1859) sold only 50,000 between 1859 and 1900 in the UK.) ”Phrenology explained everything to him, from the finite to the infinite.” - Frederick Douglass, after a breakfast with Combe, c.1840 Phrenological Societies and Journals 1820 - Edinburgh Phrenological Society, founded by George Combe, journal established in 1827, when there were 120 members. 1822 - Philadelphia Phrenological Society, journal established in 1838 1823 - London Phrenological Society 1825-1843: Phenological Societies in Paris, Aberdeen, Wakefield, Manchester, Dublin, Sheffield, Lancaster, Exeter, Dumfries; 28 societies in London alone Skull-based scientific racism 1. Phrenology 2. Brain size 3. Facial Angle Theories 4. Cephalic Index Brain Size ○ Samuel Morton was professor of anatomy at Pennsylvania Medical College. ○ In the 1830s, Morton filled skulls with birdseed to allegedly measure intelligence. ○ In Crania Americana (1839), he concludes that whites have the biggest brain, so they are most intelligent. ○ He even claimed the difference is so big that polygenism must be true. Brain Size ○ Morton’s view becomes the dominant scientific paradigm for decades: “In general, the brain is larger in mature adults than in the elderly, in men than in women, in eminent men than in men of mediocre talent, in superior races than in inferior races.” - Paul Broca (c. 1860) “We of the South should consider [Morton] as our benefactor for aiding most materially in giving to the negro his true position as an inferior race.” - R.W. Gibbs, Charleston Medical Journal (1851) Skull-based scientific racism 1. Phrenology 2. Brain size 3. Facial Angle Theories 4. Cephalic Index Worksheet - 1832 Phrenological Journal “The skulls of both [nations, Tamils and Sinhalese,] are in size considerably below the European standard.” “The moral sense of [Sinhalese] people does not seem to be powerful. In most of the skulls the organ of Conscientiousness is deficient, "with a full development of Secretiveness.” “The most striking peculiarity of the skulls before us is the great preponderance in most of the [Sinhalese skulls] of the organ of Cautiousness, and relatively moderate size of Combativeness and Destructiveness” - Edinburgh Phrenological Society’s Phrenological Journal (1832) Skull-based scientific racism 1. Phrenology 2. Brain size 3. Facial Angle Theories 4. Cephalic Index Facial Angle In 1770, Dutch anatomy professor, Pieter Camper, argued that non-white races form an intermediate stage between humans and apes using facial angles. [Greek = 100 degrees, Ape = 42 degrees] Followers: Knox (1851) - Britain, Blumenbach (1830) - Germany, Nott and Gliddon (1854) - U.S. Knox (1851) Meanwhile in England... “there are no well-marked and essential differences between the brain of the Negro and the European.” - Friedrich Tiedermann, RSL journal, 1833 (1833 is the year the British abolished slavery) Monogenism of British and U.S. Evangelical Abolitionists: “From one blood he made all the nations, that they should inhabit the whole earth” - Acts 17:26 Polygenism of U.S. Southern Evangelicals: “And Ham, the father of Canaan, saw the nakedness of his father [Noah], and told his two brethren without. And Noah awoke from his wine, and knew what his younger son had done unto him. And he said, Cursed be Canaan; a servant of servants shall he be unto his brethren.” - Genesis 9:22-25 How do political realities shape scientific claims and practice today? Can you think of any examples? Skull-based scientific racism 1. Phrenology 2. Brain size 3. Facial Angle Theories 4. Cephalic Index Cephalic Index Most widely used method for classifying races in the late 19th century. 1896 Cephalic Index Non-Projecting Jaw Long head Most widely used method for classifying races in the late 19th century. Defined by Anders Retzius, Swiss Projecting Jaw professor of anatomy, in 1843. Methodology for racial classification: Non-Projecting Jaw From a sample of 200 modern Swedish crania, he selected five he considered most typical, and measured only them to provide his national benchmark. Round head Projecting Jaw Retzius (1843) Cephalic Index Non-Projecting Jaw Long head Most widely used method for classifying races in the late 19th century. Defined by Anders Retzius, Swiss Projecting Jaw professor of anatomy, in 1843. Methodology for racial classification: Non-Projecting Jaw From a sample of 200 modern Swedish crania, he selected five he considered most typical, and measured only them to provide his national benchmark. Round head Retzius thought C.I. is hereditary. Projecting Jaw Retzius (1843) English Biology J. C. Prichard, the founder of the Ethnological Society of London, disagreed. In 1848 he compared skulls of wild boar vs. domestic hogs to show that animal skull shapes change as a result of the environment. James Hunt, the founder of the Anthropological Society of London in 1863, believed C.I. was inherited. In Hunt’s first address to the ASL, he gave his support to the Confederate States. Prichard 1848 When did biologists & anthropologists stop using the Cephalic Index as a basis for racial classification? “[The cephalic index] undergoes far-reaching changes coincident with the transfer of the people from European to American soil. For instance, the east European Hebrew, who has a very round head, becomes longheaded; the south Italian, who in Italy has an exceedingly long head, becomes more short-headed; so that in this country both approach a uniform style, as far as the roundness of the head is concerned." - Franz Boas (1894) Franz Boas 1911: The Mind of Primitive Man For Boas, the main task of the anthropology is to uncover the peculiarities of culture. Echoes of Skull-based racism are still heard in the 20th and 21st century. Before the 1994 Rwandan genocide: “In the 1920s and 1930s, the Belgians, in their role as occupying power [of Rwanda], put together a national program to try to identify individuals’ ethnic identity through phrenology, an abortive attempt to create an ethnicity scale based on measurable physical features such as height, nose width and weight, with the hope that colonial administrators would not have to rely on identity cards.” “What Really Happened in Rwanda? Pacific Standard (2009) BREAK Skull-based scientific racism 1. Phrenology 2. Brain size 3. Facial Angle Theories 4. Cephalic Index Read-Pair-Shuffle A.
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