Because of her understanding of race as a visual phenomenon (a matter of melanin), Whoopi Goldberg’s comments raised the question: what is race, a biological or a social construct? The term “biology” did not enter the English language until the early nineteenth century, at the same time that Western scientists in the emerging field of physical anthropology began to naturalize “race” as a way of standardizing racial hierarchies, with whites at the zenith and Africans at the nadir. This rationalized slavery, Native genocide, and Western imperialism in general. More
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This content originally appeared on CounterPunch.org and was authored by Eric Cheyfitz.