Professional Documents
Culture Documents
An Essay On The Inequality of The Human Races - Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia
An Essay On The Inequality of The Human Races - Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia
An Essay on the Inequality of the Human Races - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Essai sur l'ingalit des races humaines (An Essay on the Inequality of the Human Races) (18531855) by Joseph Arthur Comte de Gobineau was intended as a work of philosophical enquiry into decline and degeneration. It is today considered as one of the earliest examples of scientific racism. Expanding upon Boulainvilliers' use of ethnography to defend the Ancien Regime against the claims of the Third Estate, de Gobineau aimed for an explanatory system universal in scope: namely, that race is the primary force determining world events. Using scientific disciplines as varied as linguistics and anthropology, de Gobineau divides the human species into three major groupings, white, yellow and black, claiming to demonstrate that "history springs only from contact with the white races." Among the white races, he distinguishes the Aryan race as the pinnacle of human development, comprising the basis of all European aristocracies. However, inevitable miscegenation led to the 'downfall of civilizations'.
Contents
1 Background to the Book 2 Gobineau and the Bible 3 Superiority of the Aryans 4 Translation 5 Influence 6 References 7 Bibliography 8 External links
01/05/2012
An Essay on the Inequality of the Human Races - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Gobineau writes that "Adam is the originator of our white species" ("Adam soit lauteur de notre espce blanche"), and creatures not part of the white race are not part of that species. By this Gobineau refers to his division of humans into three main races: white, black, and yellow. The biblical division into Hamites, Semites, and Japhetites is for Gobineau a division within the white race. In general, Gobineau considers the Bible to be a reliable source of actual history, and he was not a supporter of the idea of polygenesis.
Translation
Josiah Clark Nott hired Henry Hotze to translate the work into English. Hotze's translation was published in 1856 as The Moral and Intellectual Diversity of Races, with an added essay from Hotze and appendix from Nott. However, it "omitted the laws of repulusion and attraction, which were at the heart of Gobineau's account of the role of race-mixing in the rise and fall of civilizations".[2] Gobineau was not pleased with the version; Gobineau was "particularly concerned that Hotze had ignored his comments on 'American decay generally and upon slaveholding in particular'."[3] The German translation Versuch ber die Ungleichheit der Menschenrassen first appeared in 1897 and was translated by Ludwig Schemann, a member of the Bayreuth Circle and "one of the most important racial theorists of imperial and Weimar Germany".[4] A new English language version The Inequality of Human Races, translated by Adrian Collins, was published in Britain and the USA in 1915 and remains the standard English language version. It continues to be republished in
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/An_Essay_on_the_Inequality_of_the_Human_Races 2/4
01/05/2012
An Essay on the Inequality of the Human Races - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
the USA.
Influence
Gobineau's "influence on the development of racial theory has been exaggerated and his ideas have been routinely misconstrued".[5] Gobineau's ideas found an audience in the United States and in German-speaking areas more so than in France, becoming the inspiration for a host of racial theories, for example those of Houston Stewart Chamberlain. "Gobineau was the first to theorize that race was the deciding factor in history and the precursors of Nazism repeated some of his ideas, but his principle arguments were either ignored, deformed, or taken out of context in German racial thought".[6] The Historian and Hitler-Biographer Joachim C. Fest describes Arthur de Gobineau, in particular his negative views on race mixing as expressed in his essay, as an eminent influence on Adolf Hitler and National socialism. In the Chapter "Vision" within his Book "Hitler" he writes that the influence of Gobineau on Hitler can be easily seen and that Gobineaus ideas were used by Hitler in simplified form for demagogic purposes: "Significantly, Hitler simplified Gobineau's elaborate doctrine until it became demagogically usable and offered a set of plausible explanations for all the discontents, anxieties, and crises of the contemporary scene."[7] However, Professor Steven Kale has cautioned that "Gobineaus influence on German racism has been repeatedly overstated".[8]
References
1. ^ cited in Michael D. Biddiss Father of Racist Ideology: Social and Political Thought of Count Gobineau (1970) p514 2. ^ Robert Bernasconi and Tommy L. Lott (editors) The Idea of Race Hackett Publishing Co(2000) p45 3. ^ Lonnie A. Burnett Henry Hotze, Confederate Propagandist: Selected Writings on Revolution, Recognition, and Race The University of Alabama Press (2008) p5 4. ^ Richard S. Levy (Editor) Antisemitism: A Historical Encyclopedia of Prejudice and Persecution ABC-CLIO Ltd (2005) p640 5. ^ Steven Kale Gobineau, Racism, and Legitimism: a Royalist Heretic in Nineteenth-Century France in Modern Intellectual History, 7, 1 Cambridge University Press (2010)p59 6. ^ Steven Kale Gobineau, Racism, and Legitimism: a Royalist Heretic in Nineteenth-Century France in Modern Intellectual History, 7, 1 Cambridge University Press (2010)p60 7. ^ Joachim C. Fest: "Hitler" Mariner Books (2002) p.210-211, ISBN 0156027542 8. ^ Steven Kale Gobineau, Racism, and Legitimism: a Royalist Heretic in Nineteenth-Century France in Modern Intellectual History, 7, 1 Cambridge University Press (2010)p60
Bibliography
Gobineau, Arthur (Count Joseph Arthur de Gobineau) The Inequality of Human Races translated by Adrian Collins Gobineau, Arthur (Count Joseph Arthur de Gobineau) The Moral and Intellectual Diversity of Races (http://books.google.com/books?id=cx9mAAAAMAAJ) , with particular reference to their perspective influence in the civil and political history of mankind translated by Henry Hotze Gobineau, Arthur (Count Joseph Arthur de Gobineau) Versuch Uber Die Ungleichheit Der Menschenracen' translated by Ludwig Schemann
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/An_Essay_on_the_Inequality_of_the_Human_Races 3/4
01/05/2012
An Essay on the Inequality of the Human Races - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
External links
Essai sur l'Inegalite de Races Humaine in French at Google Books Vol. 1 (http://books.google.com/books? id=ak0BAAAAQAAJ&printsec=frontcover&dq=editions:0QOsqwh7Dly1gxD3) , Vol. 2 (http://books.google.com/books? id=UGxMZOSVoBEC&printsec=frontcover&dq=editions:0QOsqwh7Dly1gxD3) , Vol. 4 (http://books.google.com/books?id=WzBL-5Ed_8C&printsec=frontcover&dq=editions:0QOsqwh7Dly1gxD3) Versuch ber die Ungleichheit der Menschenracen trans. by Ludwig Scheman at Google Books Vol. 1 (http://books.google.com/books?id=vIsQAAAAIAAJ&pg=PA1&dq=gobineau&as_brr=1#PPR3,M1) , Vol. 2 (http://books.google.com/books? id=_IsQAAAAIAAJ&pg=PA1&dq=gobineau&as_brr=1#PPP1,M1) , Vol. 3 (http://books.google.com/books? id=GYwQAAAAIAAJ&pg=PA1&dq=gobineau&as_brr=1#PPP9,M1) , Vol. 4 (http://books.google.com/books? id=Co0QAAAAIAAJ&pg=PA1&dq=gobineau&as_brr=1#PPR3,M1) The Moral and Intellectual Diversity of Races: With Particular Reference to Their Respective trans. by H. Hotz, with an Appendix by J. C. Nott (http://books.google.com/books? id=uogBAAAAQAAJ&pg=PA13&dq=gobineau&as_brr=1#PPR3,M1) Retrieved from "http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php? title=An_Essay_on_the_Inequality_of_the_Human_Races&oldid=483812120" Categories: Ethnography Sociology books Colonialism Scientific racism 1855 essays
1855 books
This page was last modified on 25 March 2012 at 07:16. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License; additional terms may apply. See Terms of use for details. Wikipedia is a registered trademark of the Wikimedia Foundation, Inc., a non-profit organization.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/An_Essay_on_the_Inequality_of_the_Human_Races
4/4