Social Construction and the Concept of Race

Bibliographic Data

ID10706233
AuthorsEdouard Machery (0000-0002-9944-6138), Luc Faucher (0000-0001-8598-3787)
Year2005
Volume72
Issue5
Pages1208-1219
Publication date2005-12-01
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenuePhilosophy of Science (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0031-8248 • E-ISSN: 1539-767X
PublisherCambridge University Press (CUP) (PUBLISHER)
DOI10.1086/508966
OpenAlexW2164315583
LanguageEN
Citations received34
References cited27

There has been little serious work to integrate the constructionist approach and the cognitive/evolutionary approach in the domain of race, although many researchers have paid lip service to this project. We believe that any satisfactory account of human beings’ racialist cognition has to integrate both approaches. In this paper, we propose to move toward this integration. We present an evolutionary hypothesis that rests on a distinction between three kinds of groups—kin-based groups, small scale coalitions, and ethnies. Following Gil-White (1999, 2001a, 2001b), we propose that ethnies have raised specific evolutionary challenges that were solved by an evolved cognitive system. We suggest that the concept of race is a byproduct of this mechanism. We argue that recent theories of cultural transmission are our best hope for integrating social constructionists’ and cognitive/evolutionary theorists’ insights

Cognition · Cognitive science · Epistemology · Evolutionary psychology · Evolutionary theory · Race (biology) · Social constructionism · Sociocultural evolution · Sociology · Cultural Differences and Values · Evolutionary Game Theory and Cooperation · Language and cultural evolution · Philosophy · Psychology · Social Psychology

Tools

Open DOISci-Hub