Ethnic & Race Relations, Social & Cultural History, Discrimination & Prejudice
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Overview
Are antisemitism and white supremacy manifestations of a general phenomenon? Why didn't racism appear in Europe before the fourteenth century, and why did it flourish as never before in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries? Why did the twentieth century see institutionalized racism in its most extreme forms? Why are egalitarian societies particularly susceptible to virulent racism? What do apartheid South Africa, Nazi Germany, and the American South under Jim Crow have in common? How did the Holocaust advance civil rights in the United States?With a rare blend of learning, economy, and cutting insight, George Fredrickson surveys the history of Western racism from its emergence in the late Middle Ages to the present. Beginning with the medieval antisemitism that put Jews beyond the pale of humanity, he traces the spread of racist thinking in the wake of European expansionism and the beginnings of the African slave trade. And he examines how the Enlightenment and nineteenth-century romantic nationalism created a new intellectual context for debates over slavery and Jewish emancipation. Fredrickson then makes the first sustained comparison between the color-coded racism of nineteenth-century America and the antisemitic racism that appeared in Germany around the same time. He finds similarity enough to justify the common label but also major differences in the nature and functions of the stereotypes invoked. The book concludes with a provocative account of the rise and decline of the twentieth century's overtly racist regimes—the Jim Crow South, Nazi Germany, and apartheid South Africa—in the context of world historical developments. This illuminating work is the first to treat racism across such a sweep of history and geography. It is distinguished not only by its original comparison of modern racism's two most significant varieties—white supremacy and antisemitism—but also by its eminent readability.Author Biography: George M. Fredrickson is Edgar E. Robinson Professor of United States History at Stanford University and codirector of the Research Institute for the Comparative Study of Race and Ethnicity. He is the author of five previous books on the history of racial ideologies: The Black Image in the White Mind, White Supremacy, The Arrogance of Race, Black Liberation, and The Comparative Imagination.
Editorials
Carlin Romano
Racism, in short, comes with a history, and it is to scrutinize racism's history and reasoning that Fredrickson decided to write this brisk, intense, incisive probe of the concept and its implications. The result is the best, most erudite introduction to racism available.— Philadelphia Inquirer
From The Critics
One of America's premier historians of racism, George Fredrickson offers an excellent guide to this evolution. Surveying the deep-seated antagonisms that still beset humanity from Ulster to Sri Lanka, he concludes that they are more fuelled by 'authentic cultural' or religious differences than by race in the genetic sense.—History Today
Kwame Anthony Appiah
In Racism: A Short History, written in his characteristically crisp, clear prose, he draws both on a wide range of recent work by others and on nearly half a century of his own writings on immigration, race and nationalism, in the United States and elsewhere, to provide us with a masterly--though not uncontroversial--synthesis.— New York Times Book Review
Publishers Weekly
An erudite comparison of racism and anti-Semitism throughout Western history, George M. Fredrickson's amazingly concise Racism: A Short History explains how medieval anti-Semitism influenced the racist rationalization of the African slave trade; shows how the Enlightenment and Romanticism opened up new avenues for thinking about Jews and slaves; and contrasts American Jim Crow laws, Nazi Germany's Aryan nation and South African apartheid. A U.S. history professor at Stanford and co-director of the Research Institute for the Comparative Study of Race and Ethnicity, Fredrickson offers a scholarly but compelling and accessible narrative. (May) Copyright 2002 Cahners Business Information.Library Journal
Amid the many books on the why's of racism comes a new analysis from Fredrickson (history, Stanford Univ.), author of several books on the history of racial ideologies, including The Arrogance of Race and Black Liberation. In this concise history, Fredrickson seeks to answer where and why racism began and what forms it has taken through the ages. Combining comparative, geographical, and historical perspectives, he studies the origin of Western racism from its emergence in the late Middle Ages to the present time. He begins by defining racism as a system that establishes a permanent racial hierarchy reflecting the laws of nature or decrees of God. Thus, stigmatized groups can never change their status and rise to a position of power within the dominant group. According to Fredrickson, this was first applied to Jews in the Middle Ages. Racism spread following European expansion and the African slave trade and grew during the Enlightenment. A particularly interesting insight is the comparison of the Jim Crow South, Nazi Germany, and apartheid South Africa. Both illuminating and distressing, this book is essential reading for anyone interested in understanding the evolution of one of the darkest sides of human nature. Recommended for informed readers in both public and academic libraries. Deborah Bigelow, Leonia P.L., NJ Copyright 2002 Cahners Business Information.Times Literary Supplement
Fredrickson [stands] out from a number of distinguished collegues [because of] his continuing urge to widen the comparative framework he uses to try to understand why these relations have developed as they did. Racism: A Short History is his most drastic venture to date—a brisk positioning of Southern racial domination within world history as a whole.— John Dunn
Choice
In this incisive and thoughtful essay on the nature and historical trajectory of racism in the modern world, Fredrickson's magisterial command of his subject is on display as he provides a concise overview of racism's rise, climax, and retreat.Kleio
Racism: A Short History is a tour de force within this genre. Richly footnoted and elegantly written, the book is a model of clarity and sophisticated analysis.— Milton Shain
The New York Times Book Review
In Racism: A Short History, written in . . . [Fredrickson's] characteristically crisp, clear prose, he draws both on a wide range of recent work by others and on nearly half a century of his own writings on immigration, race and nationalism, in the United States and elsewhere, to provide us with a masterly—though not uncontroversial—synthesis. . . . The book is worth reading just for its pathbreaking attempt to tell the stories of anti-Semitism and white supremacy together, while insisting both on their inter-connections and their differences.— Kwame Anthony Appiah
The New York Review of Books
Fredrickson deftly combines intellectual with social and political history to explain the emergence of racism and its recent decline. Learned and elegant.— William H. McNeill
The Nation
Fredrickson's book should be celebrated. The chief reason is the text itself. One of only a handful of attempts to cover Western attitudes towards race comprehensively, Fredrickson's Racism is by far the most concise and lucid. It is also the most balanced. . . . [W]hat ultimately makes Fredrickson's book so valuable is its original vision of the major racisms—its view of them as belonging to a coherent historical narrative. . . . Reviewers often apply the term 'path-breaking' to works that simply trim back a few errant branches. But Fredrickson's book really is path-breaking.— Paul Reitter
Philadelphia Inquirer
Racism, in short, comes with a history, and it is to scrutinize racism's history and reasoning that Fredrickson decided to write this brisk, intense, incisive probe of the concept and its implications. The result is the best, most erudite introduction to racism available.— Carlin Romano
The New York Times Book Review -
In Racism: A Short History, written in . . . [Fredrickson's] characteristically crisp, clear prose, he draws both on a wide range of recent work by others and on nearly half a century of his own writings on immigration, race and nationalism, in the United States and elsewhere, to provide us with a masterly—though not uncontroversial—synthesis. . . . The book is worth reading just for its pathbreaking attempt to tell the stories of anti-Semitism and white supremacy together, while insisting both on their inter-connections and their differences.The New York Review of Books -
Fredrickson deftly combines intellectual with social and political history to explain the emergence of racism and its recent decline. Learned and elegant.Times Literary Supplement -
Fredrickson [stands] out from a number of distinguished collegues [because of] his continuing urge to widen the comparative framework he uses to try to understand why these relations have developed as they did. Racism: A Short History is his most drastic venture to date—a brisk positioning of Southern racial domination within world history as a whole.The Nation -
Fredrickson's book should be celebrated. The chief reason is the text itself. One of only a handful of attempts to cover Western attitudes towards race comprehensively, Fredrickson's Racism is by far the most concise and lucid. It is also the most balanced. . . . [W]hat ultimately makes Fredrickson's book so valuable is its original vision of the major racisms—its view of them as belonging to a coherent historical narrative. . . . Reviewers often apply the term 'path-breaking' to works that simply trim back a few errant branches. But Fredrickson's book really is path-breaking.Philadelphia Inquirer -
Racism, in short, comes with a history, and it is to scrutinize racism's history and reasoning that Fredrickson decided to write this brisk, intense, incisive probe of the concept and its implications. The result is the best, most erudite introduction to racism available.Kleio -
Racism: A Short History is a tour de force within this genre. Richly footnoted and elegantly written, the book is a model of clarity and sophisticated analysis.Book Details
Published
April 23, 2002
Publisher
Princeton, N.J. : Princeton University Press, c2002.
Pages
224
Format
Hardcover
ISBN
9780691008998