Race (human categorisation)

Race is a categorisation of humans based on shared physical or social qualities into groups generally viewed as distinct within a given society. The term came into common usage during the 16th century, when it was used to refer to groups of various kinds, including those characterised by close kinship relations. By the 17th century, the term began to refer to physical (phenotypical) traits, and then later to national affiliations. Modern science regards race as a social construct, an identity which is assigned based on rules made by society. While partly based on physical similarities within groups, race does not have an inherent physical or biological meaning. The concept of race is foundational to racism, the belief that humans can be divided based on the superiority of one race over another.

• Am I not a man and a brother?
  • Anonymous, British anti-slavery slogan, made famous by the Wedgwood anti-slavery medallion (1787)

• I prefer not to use the term race, for race is a thing much more obscure and difficult to determine than is usually imagined. In dealing with it the trenchant distinctions current in the popular mind are wholly out of place.
  • Sri Aurobindo, "The Secret of the Veda" in Arya, vol. 1 (1914), p. 278, note; reprinted in India's Rebirth: A Selection from Sri Aurobindo's Writings, Talks and Speeches, 3rd ed. (2000)

• The darkness of her Oriental eye
    Accorded with her Moorish origin
  (Her blood was not all Spanish, by the by;
    In Spain, you know, this is a sort of sin).
  • Lord Byron, Don Juan, Canto I

• If we are to have that harmony and tranquility, that union of spirit which is the foundation of real national genius and national progress, we must all realize that there are true Americans who did not happen to be born in our section of the country, who do not attend our place of religious worship, who are not of our racial stock, or who are not proficient in our language. If we are to create on this continent a free republic and an enlightened civilization that will be capable of reflecting the true greatness and glory of mankind, it will be necessary to regard these differences as accidental and unessential. We shall have to look beyond the outward manifestations of race and creed. Divine providence has not bestowed upon any race a monopoly of patriotism and character. The same principle that it is necessary to apply to the attitude of mind among our own people it is also necessary to apply to the attitude of mind among the different nations.
  • Calvin Coolidge, "Toleration and Liberalism" (6 October 1925), American Legion Convention, Omaha, Nebraska

• Fleecy locks and black complexion
    Cannot forfeit nature’s claim;
  Skins may differ, but affection
    Dwells in white and black the same.
  • William Cowper, "The Negro's Complaint", st. 2, in The Gentleman's Magazine (December 1793)

• At some future period, not very distant as measured by centuries, the civilised races of man will almost certainly exterminate, and replace the savage races throughout the world.
  • Charles Darwin, The Descent of Man, and Selection in Relation to Sex (1871), Ch. VI: "On the Affinities and Genealogy of Man"

• It may be doubted whether any character can be named which is distinctive of a race and is constant.
  • Charles Darwin, The Descent of Man, and Selection in Relation to Sex (1871), Ch. VII: "On the Races of Man"

• All races and varieties of men are improvable. This is the grand distinguishing attribute of humanity, and separates man from all other animals. If it could be shown that any particular race of men are literally incapable of improvement, we might hesitate to welcome them here. But no such men are anywhere to be found, and if they were, it is not likely that they would ever trouble us with their presence. ... I know of no rights of race superior to the rights of humanity, and when there is a supposed conflict between human and national rights, it is safe to go the side of humanity.
  • Frederick Douglass, "Composite Nation", Speech delivered at Boston, Massachusetts (7 December 1869)

• Races and varieties of the human family appear and disappear, but humanity remains and will remain forever... [P]eople will one day be truer to this idea than now, and will say with Scotia's inspired son, ‍'‍A man's a man for a’ that.‍'‍ When that day shall come, they will not pervert and sin against the verity of language as they now do by calling a man of mixed blood, a negro; they will tell the truth... It is only prejudice against the negro which calls every one, however nearly connected with the white race, and however remotely connected with the negro race, a negro. The motive is not a desire to elevate the negro, but to humiliate and degrade those of mixed blood; not a desire to bring the negro up, but to cast the mulatto and the quadroon down by forcing him below an arbitrary and hated color line.
  • Frederick Douglass, "The Future of the Colored Race" (May 1886)

• My father was a mulatto, my grandfather was a negro, and my great-grandfather was an ape; my pedigree began where yours left off.
  • Alexandre Dumas, in response to being insulted by a man about his mixed-race ancestry, as quoted by Minot J. Savage, Evolution and Religion (George H. Buchanan & Co., 1886); also reported as:

    My father was a mulatto, my grandfather was a Negro, and my great-grandfather a monkey. You see, Sir, my family starts where yours ends.

• An ingenious anatomist has written a book to prove that races are imperishable, but nations are pliant political constructions, easily changed or destroyed.
  • Ralph Waldo Emerson, English Traits (Phillips, Sampson, & Co., 1856), Ch. 4

• [R]ace is not based on biology but race is rather an idea that we ascribe to biology... The biology becomes an excuse for social differences. The social differences become naturalized in biology.
  • Alan Goodman, as quoted in Race: The Power of an Illusion, "Episode One: The Difference Between Us", California Newsreel (2003)

• Racial classification is totally cultural. Who's Tiger Woods? Who's Colin Powell? Colin Powell's as Irish as he is African. Being black has been defined as just looking dark enough that anyone can see you are.
  • Stephen Jay Gould, as quoted in Race: The Power of an Illusion, "Episode Three: The House We Live In", California Newsreel (2003)

• Race is a concept that was invented to categorize the perceived biological, social, and cultural differences between human groups... Race is a human invention. We created it, we have used it in ways that have been in many, many respects quite negative and quite harmful. And we can think ourselves out of it. We made it, we can unmake it.
  • Evelynn M. Hammonds, as quoted in, Race: The Power of an Illusion, "Episode One: The Difference Between Us", California Newsreel (2003)

• The biological fact of race and the myth of "race" should be distinguished. For all practical social purposes "race" is not so much a biological phenomenon as a social myth. The myth "race" has created an enormous amount of human and social damage. In recent years it has taken a heavy toll in human lives and caused untold suffering. It still prevents the normal development of millions of human beings and deprives civilization of the effective co-operation of productive minds. The biological differences between ethnic groups should be disregarded from the standpoint of social acceptance and social action. The unity of mankind from both the biological and social viewpoint is the main thing. To recognize this and to act accordingly is the first requirement of modern man.
  • Julian Huxley, "The Race Question", sec. 14, UNESCO and its Programme, Vol. 3 (1950)

• I have received the favor of your letter of August 17th, and with it the volume you were so kind as to send me on the Literature of Negroes. Be assured that no person living wishes more sincerely than I do, to see a complete refutation of the doubts I have myself entertained and expressed on the grade of understanding allotted to them by nature, and to find that in this respect they are on a par with ourselves. My doubts were the result of personal observation on the limited sphere of my own State, where the opportunities for the development of their genius were not favorable, and those of exercising it still less so. I expressed them therefore with great hesitation; but whatever be their degree of talent it is no measure of their rights. Because Sir Isaac Newton was superior to others in understanding, he was not therefore lord of the person or property of others. On this subject they are gaining daily in the opinions of nations, and hopeful advances are making towards their reestablishment on an equal footing with the other colors of the human family. I pray you therefore to accept my thanks for the many instances you have enabled me to observe of respectable intelligence in that race of men, which cannot fail to have effect in hastening the day of their relief.
  • Thomas Jefferson, Letter to Henri Grégoire (25 February 1809), as quoted in The Science and Politics of Racial Research by William H. Tucker (1994), p. 11

• Americans of every race and color have died in battle to protect our freedom. Americans of every race and color have worked to build a nation of widening opportunities. Now our generation of Americans has been called on to continue the unending search for justice within our own borders. We believe that all men are created equal. Yet many are denied equal treatment. We believe that all men have certain unalienable rights. Yet many Americans do not enjoy those rights. We believe that all men are entitled to the blessings of liberty. Yet millions are being deprived of those blessings--not because of their own failures, but because of the color of their skin. The reasons are deeply embedded in history and tradition and the nature of man. We can understand--without rancor or hatred--how this all happened. But it cannot continue. Our Constitution, the foundation of our Republic, forbids it. The principles of our freedom forbid it. Morality forbids it.
  • Lyndon Baines Johnson, bill signing speech (2 July 1964)

• No ally is better than one's own race.
  • Kim Young-sam, as quoted in "What the West gets wrong about North Korea’s motives, and why some South Koreans admire the North", The Conversation (8 September 2017)

• Oh, East is East, and West is West, and never the twain shall meet,
  Till Earth and Sky stand presently at God’s great Judgment Seat;
  But there is neither East nor West, Border, nor Breed, nor Birth,
  When two strong men stand face to face, tho’ they come from the ends of the earth!
  • Rudyard Kipling, The Ballad of East and West (1889)

• The law of nations knows of no distinction of color, and if an enemy of the United States should enslave and sell any captured persons of their army, it would be a case for the severest retaliation, if not redressed upon complaint.
  • Lieber Code (General Orders No. 100, 24 April 1863)

• [L]et us discard all this quibbling about this man and the other man; this race and that race and the other race being inferior, and therefore they must be placed in an inferior position; discarding our standard that we have left us. Let us discard all these things, and unite as one people throughout this land, until we shall once more stand up declaring that all men are created equal.
  • Abraham Lincoln, Speech in reply to Senator Stephen A. Douglas in the Lincoln-Douglas debates of the 1858 campaign for the U.S. Senate, at Chicago, Illinois (10 July 1858)

• There are no races, there are only clines.
  • Frank B. Livingstone and Theodosius Dobzhansky, "On the Non-Existence of Human Races", Current Anthropology, Vol. 3, No. 3 (June 1962), p. 279, col. 1

• We have seen the mere distinction of color made, in the most enlightened period of time, a ground of the most oppressive dominion ever exercised by man over man.
  • James Madison, Speech at the Constitutional Convention in Pennsylvania (6 June 1787)

• The emotions between the races could never be pure; even love was tarnished by the desire to find in the other some element that was missing in ourselves. Whether we sought out our demons or salvation, the other race would always remain just that: menacing, alien, and apart.
  • Barack Obama, Dreams from My Father (1995)

• Racial differences will fade away in the New World.
  Speak not of races. The drops of different seas are alike.
  • Helena and Nicholas Roerich, Leaves of Morya’s Garden, Book One, The Call (1924), sec. 259

• The devil damn thee black, thou cream-faced loon!
  • William Shakespeare, Macbeth (1606), V, iii, 11 (Macbeth)

• I have no race prejudices nor caste prejudices nor creed prejudices. All I care to know is that a man is a human being, and that is enough for me; he can't be any worse.
  • Mark Twain, "Concerning the Jews" in Harper's (September 1899)

• I believe in recognizing every human being as a human being, neither white, black, brown nor red. When you are dealing with humanity as one family, there's no question of integration or intermarriage. It's just one human being marrying another human being, or one human being living around and with another human being.
  • Malcolm X, Interview for the Pierre Berton Show, Toronto, Ontario (19 January 1965)