Rhetoric of Race and Science American Cultures Requirement, Undergraduate Course Rhetoric 180AC, SPring 1996 Professor David Stern, University of Califronia, Berkeley Originally posted at http://www-learning.berkeley.edu/AC/archive/syllabi/RHET180AC.html Description This course explores how science has been used to establish or undermine the authority of particular views about various ethnic or racial groups in the United States, the role of those groups in formulating scientific discourse, and the rhetorical strategies used to transform social agendas into scientific fact. We will begin with an introductory section that outlines the main themes of the course by looking at how scientific theories of race are a part of our everyday experience and a historical overview of some of the main theories of race. Three subsequent segments each focus on a particular point at which theories of race and the practice of science come into contact: biological theories of race and intelligence, theories of race and sexuality, and the role of different racial groups in the scientific establishment. In each of these segments, we will begin by reading a work or small group of works that highlight the nature of the controversies in the area under discussion. These will provide a theoretical framework within which to consider the more specific documents that make up the remainder of the assigned reading, which will address specific historical or contemporary situations. Requirements a takehome midterm, two short papers (5-10 pp.), several very short writing assignments, and a final exam. The two papers and the midterm each count for 20% of your grade; the final exam counts for the other 40%. Regular attendance at class meetings is required, and more than two unexcused absences will lead to your grade being reduced by a fraction of a grade for each additional class you miss. Texts Gould The Mismeasure of Man (Norton) Harding (ed.) The "Racial" Economy of Science (Indiana UP) Jacoby and Glauberman (eds.) The Bell Curve Debate: History, Documents, Opinions (Times Books) Kevles In The Name of Eugenics: Genetics and the Uses of Human Heredity (Harvard) Omi and Winant, Racial Formation in the United States: From the 1960s to the 1990s (Routledge, second edition) Roscoe The Zuni Man-Woman (U of New Mexico Press) Spanbauer The Man Who Fell in Love With the Moon (Harper) There will also be a class reader, available from Copyworld (2154 University Avenue.) SYLLABUS Part 1 Theories of race in historical and cultural context The readings concern the history of theories of race and their role in contemporary American life, and the relationship between scientific theories of race and racial prejudice. Tuesday 1.16 Introduction; overview; goals; reading; requirements. Thursday 1.18 The American Cultures requirement; rhetoric, race, and science. Reading: "Proposal for an American Cultures Breadth Requirement" (reader #1.) Tuesday 1.23 Screening of Skin Deep. Thursday 1.25 Discussion of Skin Deep. Tuesday 1.30 Omi and Winant, Racial Formation in the United States, Part I. First paper assigned. Thursday 2.1 Omi and Winant, Racial Formation in the United States, Part II. Tuesday 2.6 Omi and Winant, Racial Formation in the United States, Part III (pp. 95-159.) Thursday 2.8 Discover special issue: "The Science of Race" (reader #1.) Tuesday 2.13 Research methods training session with Corliss Lee, American Cultures Librarian. Part 2 Biological theories of race and intelligence This segment will consider the history of biological theories of the nature of race and its relationship to intelligence, such as work on craniometry, craniology, eugenics and intelligence testing, philosophical challenges to the coherence of the notions of race and intelligence as they are used in this debate, and the rhetorical significance of contemporary appeals to scientific evidence about race and intelligence. Thursday 2.15 Craniometry, craniology, and the scientific construction of race. Gould The Mismeasure of Man chs. 1-2. Harding The "Racial" Economy of Science, pp. 116-141. Kevles In The Name of Eugenics: Genetics and the Uses of Human Heredity ch. 1. Tuesday 2.20 Measuring heads and bodies; race, gender and the role of analogy in science. Gould The Mismeasure of Man chs. 3-4. Harding The "Racial" Economy of Science, pp. 359-376. Thursday 2.22 Eugenics and the hereditarian theory of IQ. First paper due. Gould The Mismeasure of Man pp. 146-174. Kevles In The Name of Eugenics: Genetics and the Uses of Human Heredity chs. 4-9. Tuesday 2.27 Terman, Yerkes and the politics of IQ. Gould The Mismeasure of Man pp. 174-233. Jacoby and Glauberman The Bell Curve Debate, pp. 510-582. Thursday 2.29 Burt, Jensen, and Herrnstein: the reification of intelligence. Take-home midterm handed out. Gould The Mismeasure of Man pp. 234-296, 317-336. Harding The "Racial" Economy of Science, pp. 142-160. Jacoby and Glauberman The Bell Curve Debate, pp. 599-639. Tuesday 3.5 Current controversy over race and intelligence. Kevles In The Name of Eugenics: Genetics and the Uses of Human Heredity chs. 17-18. Murray and Hernstein The Bell Curve introduction, and chs. 13-14. (reader #2) Thursday 3.7 Responding to The Bell Curve. Jacoby and Glauberman The Bell Curve Debate, selections. Part 3 Who gets to do science? This segment takes a comparative and historical approach to the question of the role of different racial groups in the practice of science, both in the formulation of scientific discourse and the conduct of scientific research. The principal focus is on the role of European Americans and African Americans in the scientific establishment. Some attention will also be given to an international perspective on American science, comparing the culture and values of European American, Asian American and Japanese physicists. Tuesday 3.12 The rejection of scientific racism. Harding The "Racial" Economy of Science, pp. 161-200. Thursday 3.14 The experience of black scientists. Take-home midterm due. Harding The "Racial" Economy of Science, pp. 201-258. Douglass "The Claims of the Negro Ethnologically Considered" (reader #2) Tuesday 3.19 Primatology and physics in a multicultural field. Harding The "Racial" Economy of Science, pp. 259-267, 377-407. Thursday 3.21 Science, race, and morality. Second paper assigned. Harding The "Racial" Economy of Science, pp. 275-286, 341-358, 440-471. Spring Break. Tuesday 3.26 & Thursday 3.28. Part 4 "Berdache" and the scientific study of sexuality This segment will address scientific theories of race and sexuality by way of a study of the history and theory of "berdache." We will first consider Foucault's and McIntosh's social constructionist accounts of sexuality, and consider the extent to which they are applicable to the debate over the role of "berdache" in indigenous American culture, looking at work written by historians, anthropologists, and native Americans. We will compare treatment of sexual and racial difference by these authors, and the relation between their views about the relationship between social construction and scientific realism and the particular theories and approaches that they advocate. We will conclude by reading a recent novel about a berdache that will provide a final opportunity to reflect on the relationship between race and sexuality. Tuesday 4.2 Homosexuality and social construction. Foucault The History of Sexuality, Volume I chapter 2 (reader) McIntosh "The Homosexual Role" (reader) Halperin "100 Years of Homosexuality" & "`Homosexuality': A Cultural Construct" (reader) Thursday 4.4 The spirit and the flesh: sexual diversity in American Indian culture Williams "The Character of the Berdache" (reader) Tuesday 4.9 From "berdache" to "two-spirit." Katz "Native Americans/Gay Americans: 1528-1976" (reader) Whitehead "The bow and the burden strap" (reader) Weinrich "Reality or Social Construction?" (reader) Jacobs & Thomas "Native American Two-Spirits" (reader) Thursday 4.11 Who was We'Wha? Roscoe The Zuni Man-Woman, prologue, and chs. 1-4. Roscoe "Was We'Wha a homosexual?" (reader) Tuesday 4.16 Where do berdaches come from? Roscoe The Zuni Man-Woman, chs. 5-8. Roscoe "How to become a berdache: toward a unified analysis of gender diversity" (reader) Thursday 4.18 Meeting with Will Roscoe. Second paper due. Tuesday 4.23 Killdeer. Spanbauer The Man Who Fell in Love With the Moon, Book 1. Thursday 4.25 Journey and homecoming. Spanbauer The Man Who Fell in Love With the Moon, Books 2-3. Tuesday 4.30 Devil. Spanbauer The Man Who Fell in Love With the Moon, Book 4 and epilogue. Thursday 5.2 Conclusion.
