Introduction to Race and Biology

Abstract

The notion of race, as commonly employed, is often and spontaneously associated with a biological foundation. To explain this connection with biology it is necessary to undertake an archaeological approach to the concept of race. Such an approach will identify different semantic strata, which, for both the scientific community and lay circles, have come to overlap. The first stratum corresponds to the period before biology was recognized as a scientific discipline. There was a longstanding te...