In the decades before the Civil War, Charleston, South Carolina, enjoyed recognition as the center of scientific activity in the South. By 1850, only three other cities in the United States--Philadelphia, Boston, and New York--exceeded Charleston in natural history studies, and the city boasted an excellent museum of natural history. Examining the scientific activities and contributions of John Bachman, Edmund Ravenel, John Edwards Holbrook, Lewis R. Gibbes, Francis S. Holmes, and John McCrady, Lester Stephens uncovers the important achievements of Charleston's circle of naturalists in a region that has conventionally been dismissed as largely devoid of scientific interests. Stephens devotes particular attention to the special problems faced by the Charleston naturalists and to the ways in which their religious and racial beliefs interacted with and shaped their scientific pursuits. In the end, he shows, cultural commitments proved stronger than scientific principles. When the South seceded from the Union in 1861, the members of the Charleston circle placed regional patriotism above science and union and supported the Confederate cause. The ensuing war had a devastating impact on the Charleston naturalists--and on science in the South. The Charleston circle never fully recovered from the blow, and a century would elapse before the South took an equal role in the pursuit of mainstream scientific research.

2019 Best-Of Lists: 10 Best Science Books of the Year (Smithsonian Magazine) · Best Science Books of the Year (NPR's Science Friday) · Best Science and Technology Books from 2019” (Library Journal) An astute and timely examination of the re-emergence of scientific research into racial differences. Superior tells the disturbing story of the persistent thread of belief in biological racial differences in the world of science. After the horrors of the Nazi regime in World War II, the mainstream scientific world turned its back on eugenics and the study of racial difference. But a worldwide network of intellectual racists and segregationists quietly founded journals and funded research, providing the kind of shoddy studies that were ultimately cited in Richard Herrnstein and Charles Murray’s 1994 title The Bell Curve, which purported to show differences in intelligence among races. If the vast majority of scientists and scholars disavowed these ideas and considered race a social construct, it was an idea that still managed to somehow survive in the way scientists thought about human variation and genetics. Dissecting the statements and work of contemporary scientists studying human biodiversity, most of whom claim to be just following the data, Angela Saini shows us how, again and again, even mainstream scientists cling to the idea that race is biologically real. As our understanding of complex traits like intelligence, and the effects of environmental and cultural influences on human beings, from the molecular level on up, grows, the hope of finding simple genetic differences between “races”—to explain differing rates of disease, to explain poverty or test scores, or to justify cultural assumptions—stubbornly persists. At a time when racialized nationalisms are a resurgent threat throughout the world, Superior is a rigorous, much-needed examination of the insidious and destructive nature of race science—and a powerful reminder that, biologically, we are all far more alike than different.

John Bachman (1790-1874) was an internationally renowned naturalist and a prominent Lutheran minister. This is the first collection of his writings, containing selections from his three major books, his letters, and his articles on plants and animals, education, religion, agriculture, and the human species. Bachman was the leading authority on North American mammals. He was responsible for the descriptions of the 147 mammal species included in Viviparous Quadrupeds of North America, a massive work produced in collaboration with John James Audubon. Bachman relied entirely on scientific evidence in his work and was exceptional among his fellow naturalists for studying the whole of natural history. Bachman also relied on scientific evidence in his Doctrine of the Unity of the Human Race. He showed that human beings constitute a single species that developed as varieties equivalent to the varieties of domesticated animals. In this work, perhaps his most significant accomplishment, Bachman stood nearly alone in challenging the polygenetic views of Louis Agassiz and others that white and black people descended from different progenitors. Bachman was also an important figure in the establishment of Lutheranism in the Southeast. He wrote the first American monograph on the doctrines of Martin Luther and the history of the Reformation. Bachman served for fifty-six years as minister of St. John's Lutheran Church in Charleston, South Carolina, and was one of the founders of Newberry College.

On January 20th, 2009, the United States entered a new era in terms of race relations in the country. The hopes of many Americans were not to be fulfilled and many believe race relations are worse now. The reason is the legacy of race is integral to the American nation. The Religion of White Supremacy in the United States traces this legacy to show how race is defined by more than beliefs or acts of injustice. What this book reveals is that white supremacy is a religion in the United States. This book is a theo-historical account of race in the United States that argues that white supremacy functions through the Protestant Christian tradition. The Religion of White Supremacy in the United States is an interdisciplinary work of Critical Whiteness Studies, American History, and Theology to build a narrative in which the religion of white supremacy dominates U.S. culture and society. In this way, the racial tensions during the Obama era become sensible and inevitable in a nation that finds ultimacy in white supremacy.

During Reconstruction, former abolitionists in the North had a golden opportunity to pursue true racial justice and permanent reform in America. But after the sacrifice made by thousands of Union soldiers to arrive at this juncture, the moment soon slipped away, leaving many whites throughout the North and South more racist than before. Edward J. Blum takes a fresh look at the reasons for this failure in Reforging the White Republic, focusing on the vital role that religion played in reunifying northern and southern whites into a racially segregated society. A blend of history and social science, Reforging the White Republic offers a surprising perspective on the forces of religion as well as nationalism and imperialism at a critical point in American history.

Eighty-one years after America witnessed the Scopes trial over the teaching of evolution in public schools, the debate between science and religion continues. In this book scholars from a variety of disciplines—sociology, history, science, and theology—provide new insights into the contemporary dialogue as well as some perspective suggestions for delineating the responsibilities of both the scientific and religious spheres. Why does the tension between science and religion continue? How have those tensions changed during the past one hundred years? How have those tensions impacted the public debate about so-called “intelligent design” as a scientific alternative to evolution? With wit and wisdom the authors address the conflict from its philosophical roots to its manifestations within American culture. In doing so, they take an important step toward creating a society that reconciles scientific inquiry with the human spirit. This book, which marks the one hundredth anniversary of The Terry Lecture Series, offers a unique perspective for anyone interested in the debate between science and religion in America.

A provocative overview of the history of the race concept in European and American science, based on current research that shows how race and science grew together in Western thought. What, historically, has the term 'race' meant? What is the relationship between the scientific study of race and racism? Race, Racism, and Science: Social Impact and Interaction explores these questions as it recaps the history of race-centered research from its origins in the late 1700s to Darwin's influential work on natural selection to the present. It is a compelling introduction to the way race science initially gained acceptance and how race studies both reflect and shape their times. Readers will see how scientific and pseudoscientific explanations of racial differences (social Darwinism, eugenics, craniometry, scientific racism) provided intellectual cover for inhuman acts, and how Ashley Montagu, Richard Lewontin, and other 20th-century antiracists fought to refute the scientific support of bigotry.

This anthology draws bold comparisons between secularist strategies to contain, privatize, and discipline religion and the treatment of racialized subjects by the American state. Specializing in history, literature, anthropology, theology, religious studies, and political theory, contributors expose secularism's prohibitive practices in all facets of American society and suggest opportunities for change.

This work fills a gap in recent studies on the history of race and science. Focusing on both the classification systems of human variety and the development of science as the arbiter of truth, Brown looks at the rise of the emerging sciences of life and society – biology and sociology – as well as the debate surrounding slavery and abolition.