About the Book
In the early eighteenth century, Christianity began to lose its hold on the story of humankind. Yet ingrained xenophobia, religious intolerance and emerging biological ideas did not simply disappear. Instead, secular thinkers reshaped them as they looked to redefine what it meant to be human. By century’s end, naturalists and philosophers had categorised humanity into races using Enlightenment-era ideas and methods.
In The Race Makers, Enlightenment specialist Andrew S. Curran traces the emergence of race through thirteen pivotal figures, including Louis XIV, Buffon, Carl Linnaeus, Voltaire, David Hume, Adam Smith, Immanuel Kant and Thomas Jefferson. From the gilded halls of Versailles to the slave plantations of the Caribbean, and from the court of the Mughal Empire to the drawing rooms of Monticello, Curran reveals how the pursuit of knowledge became entangled with – and often drove – systems of empire and oppression. The result is a bold reappraisal of the Enlightenment’s most celebrated luminaries.
Combining rigorous scholarship with vivid storytelling, The Race Makers delivers a sweeping and unsettling account of the origins of modern concepts of race – and why they continue to matter today.
About the Author
Andrew S. Curran is the William Armstrong Professor of Humanities at Wesleyan University. A writer-scholar fascinated by the eighteenth century, his writing has appeared in The New York Review of Books, New York Times, The Guardian, Newsweek, TIME, Paris Review, El País and The Wall Street Journal. Curran is the author and editor of five books, including Diderot and the Art of Thinking Freely, and, with Henry Louis Gates, Jr., Who’s Black and Why?.
Reviews
‘This book is urgently needed. It restores vitality to the story of how race became a dominant political and scientific idea, extending familiar narratives with provocative new detail. The Race Makers energizes a critical history of the idea of racial hierarchy – and shows that alternatives to raciality exist.’ Paul Gilroy, author of There Ain’t No Black in the Union Jack
‘[A] brilliant study … Curran concludes by spotlighting Black intellectuals of the era in a fascinating counter-history. A thorough and eminently readable dissection of a pernicious lie.’ Publishers Weekly, Starred Review
‘An illuminating intellectual biography of 'race' ... Curran reveals the fascinating stories of the men who crafted it into being, and the impact of their actions on the lives of millions.’ Priyamvada Gopal, author of Insurgent Empire: Anticolonial Resistance and British Dissent
‘In this immensely informative and highly readable inquiry into the origins of Enlightenment thinking about race, Curran demonstrates that ideas cannot be understood apart from the people who produced them. This is intellectual biography performed at the very highest level.’ Maurice Samuels, Betty Jane Anlyan Professor of French at Yale University and author of Alfred Dreyfus: The Man at the Center of the Affair
'The story of an idea as dangerous as race is one that few are brave enough to tell. In thirteen sparkling biographical cameos, Andrew Curran – sharp-eyed intellectual historian and large-hearted storyteller – takes us on a journey to the dark side of the Enlightenment, introducing us to the men whose ideas contributed to unimaginable suffering, but whose ideals still infuse our hope for change.' Janice P. Nimura, author of The Doctors Blackwell, Pulitzer Prize finalist
‘As wonderfully accessible as it is meticulously researched, Andrew Curran’s The Race Makers relates the birth of the modern concept of race through the personal stories of the Enlightenment figures who helped shape it. The book is a true gift for readers who seek to understand this complicated story.’ Robert Bernasconi, author of The Critical Philosophy of Race
