Synopses & Reviews
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Table of Contents. Read
Chapter 1.
"Science for Segregation adds considerably to our understanding of racist ideologies and their persistance in the post-war era. The author has done an admirable job of covering a forgotten chapter in the struggle over segregation and shedding light on how scientific research can become highly politicized."
Journal of American History
"This book asks if science can be divorced from politics. . . . Recommended."
Choice
"A fascinating and comprehensive look at a largely neglected aspect of American historythe role of science and scientists in supporting and sustaining white racist thought and institutions during the battle over de-segregation. And like most good social history, it does not require much strain to draw the relevance to today's debates about the salience of biological taxonomies of race."
Troy Duster, author of Backdoor to Eugenics
"A very important book that explores the fuzzy zone between science and pseudo-science, exposing the political action of right-wing scientists in the 1950s and 1960s who argued for school segregation on ostensibly scientific grounds. The role of science as an authority in society has never been more evident than in the work and rhetoric of these zealously racist scholars. This well-researched book is a must-read for anyone interested in modern debates over the study of human diversity or the role of science in contemporary society."
Jonathan Marks, author of What It Means to Be 98% Chimpanzee: Apes, People, and Their Genes
"A deeply-researched, fascinating, and judicious assessment of the [scientific' arguments that were marshaled against the Supreme Court's landmark school desegregation decision. Jackson has made a contribution that will endure."
Raymond Wolters,author of Du Bois and His Rivals
"Jackson's thorough research and a nuanced understanding of the complexities of race and law provide a disturbing cadence to the ongoing debate on race in America."
Multicultural Review
In this fascinating examination of the intriguing but understudied period following the landmark Brown v. Board of Education decision, John Jackson examines the scientific case aimed at dismantling the legislation.
Offering a trenchant assessment of the so-called scientific evidence, Jackson focuses on the 1959 formation of the International Society for the Advancement of Ethnology and Eugenics (IAAEE), whose expressed function was to objectively investigate racial differences and publicize their findings. Notable figures included Carleton Putnam, Wesley Critz George, and Carleton Coon. In an attempt to link race, eugenics and intelligence, they launched legal challenges to the Brown ruling, each chronicled here, that went to trial but ultimately failed.
The history Jackson presents speaks volumes about the legacy of racism, as we can see similar arguments alive and well today in such books as The Bell Curve and in other debates on race, science, and intelligence. With meticulous research and a nuanced understanding of the complexities of race and law, Jackson tells a disturbing tale about race in America.
Review
"Science for Segregation adds considerably to our understanding of racist ideologies and their persistance in the post-war era. The author has done an admirable job of covering a forgotten chapter in the struggle over segregation and shedding light on how scientific research can become highly politicized." - Journal of American History
Review
"A well-researched and well-argued book....Jackson underscored the nexus of 'science' and 'race,' probes the 'demarcation between science and politics,' and questions the very meaning of 'objective' scientific inquiry." - Historian
Review
“This book asks if science can be divorced from politics. . . . Recommended.”
-Choice,
Review
“A fascinating and comprehensive look at a largely neglected aspect of American history—the role of science and scientists in supporting and sustaining white racist thought and institutions during the battle over de-segregation. And like most good social history, it does not require much strain to draw the relevance to today's debates about the salience of biological taxonomies of race.”
-Troy Duster,author of Backdoor to Eugenics
Review
“Jackson is at his best when exposing the connections of leading racialists with former Nazi party members and Holocaust-denial groups.”
“A well-researched and well-argued book. . . . Jackson underscored the nexus of 'science' and 'race,' probes the 'demarcation between science and politics,' and questions the very meaning of ‘objective’ scientific inquiry.”
“Science for Segregation adds considerably to our understanding of racist ideologies and their persistance in the post-war era. The author has done an admirable job of covering a forgotten chapter in the struggle over segregation and shedding light on how scientific research can become highly politicized.”
“This book asks if science can be divorced from politics. . . . Recommended.”
“A fascinating and comprehensive look at a largely neglected aspect of American history—the role of science and scientists in supporting and sustaining white racist thought and institutions during the battle over de-segregation. And like most good social history, it does not require much strain to draw the relevance to today's debates about the salience of biological taxonomies of race.”
Review
"This book provides the best introduction yet published to the wide and exciting study of war and culture. Readers interested in war, culture, and their roles in global history will find here some of the best current research and writing on the topic."-Michael S. Neiberg,author of Dance of the Furies
Review
"A terrific demonstration of the fresh insights cultural analysis can bring to military history. The fascinating range of case studies shows that cultures of war are recoverable--and well worth recovering--from Assyrian times to the present and from all over the globe."-Stephen Morillo,Professor of History, Wabash College
Review
“No future discussion of this fraught topic will be complete without this collection of essays. Vivid arguments, telling points, striking reformulations: this will be a standard work for decades.”-Robert Citino,author of The German Way of War: From the Thirty Years' War to the Third Reich
Synopsis
In this fascinating examination of the intriguing but understudied period following the landmark
Brown v. Board of Education decision, John Jackson examines the scientific case aimed at dismantling the legislation.
Offering a trenchant assessment of the so-called scientific evidence, Jackson focuses on the 1959 formation of the International Society for the Advancement of Ethnology and Eugenics (IAAEE), whose expressed function was to objectively investigate racial differences and publicize their findings. Notable figures included Carleton Putnam, Wesley Critz George, and Carleton Coon. In an attempt to link race, eugenics and intelligence, they launched legal challenges to the Brown ruling, each chronicled here, that went to trial but ultimately failed.
The history Jackson presents speaks volumes about the legacy of racism, as we can see similar arguments alive and well today in such books as The Bell Curve and in other debates on race, science, and intelligence. With meticulous research and a nuanced understanding of the complexities of race and law, Jackson tells a disturbing tale about race in America.
Synopsis
It has long been acknowledged that the study of war and warfare demands careful consideration of technology, institutions, social organization, and more. But, for some, the so-called "war and society" approach increasingly included everything but explained nothing, because it all too often seemed to ignore the events on the battlefield itself.
The military historians in Warfare and Culture in World History return us to the battlefield, but they do so through a deep examination of the role of culture in shaping military institutions and military choices. Collected here are some of the most provocative recent efforts to analyze warfare through a cultural lens, drawing on and aggressively expanding traditional scholarship on war and society through sophisticated cultural analysis. With chapters ranging from an organizational analysis of American Civil War field armies to the soldiers' culture of late Republican Rome and debates within Ming Chinese officialdom over extermination versus pacification, this one volume provides a full range of case studies of how culture, whether societal, strategic, organizational, or military, could shape not only military institutions but also actual battlefield choices.
About the Author
Wayne E. Lee is Professor of History at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. His books include Barbarians and Brothers: Anglo-American Warfare, 1500-1865 and Empires and Indigenes: Intercultural Alliance, Imperial Expansion, and Warfare in the Early Modern World (NYU Press).