The fifteen essays by distinguished philosopher of race Robert Bernasconi that are collected here demonstrate why the critical philosophy of race needs to take a historical turn. Genealogies of the concepts of both race and racism clarify why some of the dominant strategies for combatting racism tend to be ineffective. For example, the Boasian/UNESCO strategy that highlights biology's rejection of race neglects cultural racism. Drawing on the work of Frantz Fanon, the late Sartre, and Michel Foucault, Robert Bernasconi argues for a holistic approach that integrates the concrete experience of racism faced by individuals into the study of institutional, structural, and systemic racism. His philosophical studies of such Black philosophers as Ottobah Cugoano, Ant?nor Firmin, and W. E. B. Du Bois, contribute to challenging the dominant philosophical canon. This volume will be an essential resource for scholars and students interested in this resurgent topic.

Robert Bernasconi is Edwin Erle Sparks Professor of Philosophy and African American Studies at the Pennsylvania State University. He is the author of two books on Heidegger and one on Sartre, as well as numerous articles in continental philosophy and the history of philosophy, especially as it relates to the history of racism. He has edited a number of volumes of primary source material and he is the editor of three journals: Critical Philosophy of Race, Levinas Studies, and Eco-Ethica.

Foreword by Linda Martin Alcoff
Introduction by Robert Bernasconi
Acknowledgments
Note on Sources
I. What Is Critical Philosophy of Race in the Continental Tradition?
Chapter 1. Critical Philosophy of Race
II. The Construction of Race
Chapter 2. Racialization and the Construction of Religions
Chapter 3. The Philosophy of Race in the Nineteenth Century
Chapter 4. Racial Science in the Nineteenth Century
Chapter 5. The Policing of Race Mixing: The Place of Biopower within the History of Racisms
Chapter 6. Crossed Lines in the Racialization Process: Race as a Border Concept
III. Black Philosophers Speak Out
Chapter 7. Ottobah Cugoano's Place in the History of Political Philosophy: Slavery and the Philosophical Canon
Chapter 8. A Haitian in Paris: Anténor Firmin as a Philosopher Against Racism
Chapter 9. ?Our Duty to Conserve?: W. E. B. Du Bois's Philosophy of History in Context
Chapter 10. Frantz Fanon and Psychopathology: The Progressive Infrastructure of Black Skin, White Masks
Chapter 11. Frantz Fanon's Engagement with Phenomenology: Unlocking the Temporal Architecture of Black Skin, White Masks
IV. The Construction of the Concept of Racism
Chapter 12. Nature, Culture, and Race
Chapter 13. A Most Dangerous Error: The Boasian Myth of a Knock-Down Argument against Racism
Chapter 14. Making Nietzsche's Thought Groan: The History of Racisms and Foucault's Genealogy of Nietzschean Genealogy in "Society Must Be Defended "
Chapter 15. Existentialism Against Colonialism: Sartre, Fanon, and the Place of Lived Experience
Bibliography
Index