The Race Illusion

On the Reality of Racialization and the Myth of Race
Erscheinungsjahr 2025
ISBN: 978-0-19-892601-6
Verlag: Oxford University Press

Buch, Englisch, 224 Seiten, Format (B × H): 138 mm x 216 mm

In The Race Illusion, Adam Hochman argues that there are no human races, only racialized groups-groups mistakenly believed to be races. He meticulously critiques all of the major defenses of the view that races exist, beginning with biological accounts. While there is some human biological diversity, it is not distributed in a way that would justify racial classification. Hochman shows how modern attempts to revive race as a biological category either trivialize the category or change the topic entirely.

Many now believe race to be a 'social construct,' a phrase Hochman criticizes for its ambiguity. The idea of race is a social invention, racial classification is determined by social factors, and racism is a social phenomenon. However, that does not mean that 'race' itself is social. Hochman argues that for social races to exist, they would need to be definable in terms of social properties; in spite of this, scholars have been unable to identify the social properties that plausibly make a group a race.

After examining ten biological and seven social accounts of race, Hochman develops and defends the view in The Race Illusion that there are no races, only racialized groups. He argues that rejecting 'race' as a category of analysis and replacing it with 'racialized group' is not only the most theoretically sound approach, but also the one best suited to fighting racism.

Autoren/Hrsg.

Hochman, Adam

Fachgebiete

• Geisteswissenschaften Philosophie Philosophie: Sachbuch
• Geisteswissenschaften Geschichtswissenschaft Geschichtliche Themen Kultur- und Ideengeschichte
• Geisteswissenschaften Philosophie Sozialphilosophie, Politische Philosophie
• Geisteswissenschaften Geschichtswissenschaft Geschichtliche Themen Mentalitäts- und Sozialgeschichte
• Sozialwissenschaften Politikwissenschaft Politikwissenschaft Allgemein Politische Theorie, Politische Philosophie

Über Autor(innen)

Adam Hochman is Senior Lecturer in Philosophy at Macquarie University in Sydney, Australia. He works on the philosophies of biology, psychology, and race.