The Victorian Reinvention of Race

Not until the early nineteenth century would polygenetic and racialist theories win many adherents. But by the middle of the nineteenth century in England, racial categories were imposed upon humanity. How the idea of 'race' gained popularity in England at that time is the central focus of The Victorian Reinvention of Race: New Racisms and the Problem of Grouping in the Human Sciences.

Edward Beasley is Associate Professor of History at San Diego State University. He is the author of Empire as the Triumph of Theory: Imperialism, Information, and the Colonial Society of 1868 (London: Routledge, 2004), and Mid-Victorian Imperialists: British Gentlemen and the Empire of the Mind (London: Routledge, 2005).

1. Introduction - Reinventing Racism 2. Tocqueville and Race 3. Gobineau, Bagehot's Precursor 4. The Common Sense of Walter Bagehot 5. Bagehot Rewrites Gobineau 6. Darwin and Race 7. Argyll, Race, and Degeneration 8. Frederick Weld and the Unnamed Neighbours 9. By Way of a Conclusion - Arthur Gordon