Rethinking Race

Because science has shown that racial essentialism is false, and because the idea of race has proved virulent, many people believe we should eliminate the word and concept entirely. Michael O. Hardimon criticizes this line of thinking, arguing that we must recognize the real ways in which race exists in order to revise our understanding of its significance. Pernicious, traditional racialism maintains that people can be ranked according to innate racial features. Those who would eliminate race make the mistake of associating the word only with this view. Hardimon agrees that this concept…