African American History Culture : The Enlightenment’s Dark Side How the Enlightenment created modern race thinking, and why we should confront it

[Clyde C Coger Jr]

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The Enlightenment’s Dark Side
How the Enlightenment created modern race thinking, and why we should confront it

The Enlightenment’s Dark Side - Slate - Pocket

How the Enlightenment created modern race thinking, and why we should confront it.

getpocket.com

We still live in a world shaped by Enlightenment ideas of race and white supremacy. These notions of inherent inferiority still hold purchase in our society. And political liberalism is still too compatible with both. The path to a truly universal liberalism—one that can actually liberate—demands that we grapple with its ugly heritage. To confront the paradox of the Enlightenment is to take its values seriously; to dismiss it is to prefer hagiography to truth.

Jamelle Bouie

Slate|

John Locke, and a wood graving of white trader inspecting an African slave during a sale circa 1850. Photo illustration by Slate. Images by ullstein bild/Getty Images, MPI/Getty Images


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