History of the concept of race in France

Fourth session of the seminar Racism and Anti-Semitism: global, national and local perspectives with Olivier Dutour (EPHE) and Régis Meyran (Université Paris-Descartes).

Ambivalences of French scientific anti-racism in the 1930s: the case of the journal Races et racisme

How can we be anti-racist and defend racial taxonomy, even the "purity" of the "Jewish race", and even condone Nazi eugenics? Analysis of the ideas of anthropologists, biologists, philosophers and historians from the journal Races et racisme, published between 1937 and 1939, shows how the fight against racism in the name of science, progress and reason is in contradiction among the best intentioned scientists, with their nationalist representations and their racial stereotypes.

Régis Meyran is an associate researcher at CANTHEL (Paris-Descartes University) and scientific coordinator of PIRA. He notably published Le mythe de l’identité nationale (Berg International, 2009) and (co-edited with Laurence De Cock) Paniques Identitaires, Le Croquant, 2017.