	Login Cart Advanced Search
Our List Bestsellers Current Bestsellers All-Time Bestsellers Activism General Economic Justice Environmental Justice Education Reform Racial Justice Community Action Immigration Reform American Society General Anthropology Cultural Studies General Latin American Native American Myths Made In America Economics Law and Society Philosophy Sociology Sports and Society Child and Family Issues Adoption General Charlottesville Syllabus Media and Technology Biography and Memoir Autobiography and Memoir Biography Disability Disability Environment and Conservation Energy and Climate Conservation Food and Agriculture Wildlife Nature and Environment Concord Library Series Gardening General Biography and Memoir Feminism and Gender Feminism Gender Women's History Women's Literature Black Women Writers Bluestreak Series General Women's Lives Sexuality Biography and Memoir History American History General Early American History 19th Century American History 20th Century American History 21st Century American History African American History General The King Legacy ReVisioning History Adult Editions Young Readers Editions World History Africa Asia Central and South America Europe Middle East Literature and the Arts Fiction Poetry Nonfiction General Essays Food and Society Letters Memoirs Queer Perspectives Multicultural Interest African American Asian American Caribbean Latin American Middle Eastern Native American South Asian By Series Black Women Writers Bluestreak Concord Writers Young Adult Music The Arts National Poetry Series Raised Voices Poetry Series Politics and Current Events Politics and Current Events Progressive Education LGBT Issues Books for K-12 Classroom Use Teaching and the Classroom Higher Education History of Education Race and Education School Reform and Policy Race Education Democracy Series Queer Perspectives Education and Youth Fiction General Memoir Religion and Sexuality Queer Ideas Queer Action Transgender Perspectives Transgender Voices Also of Interest Race and Ethnicity in America General African American History African American Literature Fiction and Poetry Nonfiction Black Women Writers Celebrating Black Women Writers King Legacy Series Race Education Democracy Series Black History Month Religion How We Live Our Beliefs Pluralism Buddhism Christianity African American Theology Catholicism Early Christianity General Protestant Islam Judaism Unitarian Universalism World Religions Gender and Sexuality Inspiration Science and Medicine Public Health Medicine Science Psychology Women's Health Quarantine Resources Inspiring Reads Remaking Society Books to Get Lost In YA and Children's Audiobooks Books by Mary Oliver Poetry and Prose Audiobooks Spring 2024 Summer 2024 Fall 2024 Blog About About Beacon Address and Directions Awards Booksellers and Librarians Catalogs Staff Distribution Sales and Ordering Submission Guidelines Contact Customer Service Author Appearances Jobs and Internships Media Requests Rights and Permissions Resources Book Banning Resources Desk and Exam Copy Information Reading Guides Teacher Guides Guides for UUs and Book Groups Social Impact

Superior

The Return of Race Science

Author: Angela Saini

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)

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.

“An important and timely reminder that race is ‘a social construct’ with ‘no basis in biology.’”
—Kirkus Reviews, Starred Review

“A well-argued, timely, sobering wake-up call for those who believe science is always objective and apolitical. Highly recommended for academic researchers, journalists, and general science readers alike.”
—Library Journal, Starred Review

“[A] brilliant critique of ‘race science’ . . . this is an important and, in an era of rising racial tensions, must-read book, especially for those most sure they do not need to read it.”
—Publishers Weekly

“Superior: The Return of Race Science makes the compelling case that scientific racism is as prevalent as it has ever been, and explores the way such backward beliefs have continued to evolve and persist. And it couldn’t be more timely.”
—Bitch

“A rigorously researched and reported journey from the Enlightenment through nineteenth-century imperialism and twentieth-century eugenics to the stealthy revival of race science in the twenty-first century.”
—Financial Times

“In Superior, Saini expertly chronicles the broader social forces that have reinvigorated race science . . . . For such a weighty topic, Superior is a surprisingly easy-to-read blend of science reporting, cultural criticism, and personal reflection.”
—Slate

“Whether you think of racist science as bad science, evil science, alt-right science, or pseudoscience, why would any contemporary scientist imagine that gross inequality is a fact of nature, rather than of political history? Angela Saini’s Superior connects the dots, laying bare the history, continuity, and connections of modern racist science, some more subtle than you might think. This is science journalism at its very best!”
—Jonathan Marks, author of Tales of the Ex-Apes: How We Think About Human Evolution

“Angela Saini’s investigative and narrative talents shine in Superior, her compelling look at racial biases in science past and present. The result is both a crystal-clear understanding of why race science is so flawed, and why science itself is so vulnerable to such deeply troubling fault lines in its approach to the world around us—and to ourselves.”
—Deborah Blum, author of The Poison Squad: One Chemist’s Single-Minded Crusade for Food Safety at the Turn of the Twentieth Century

“Some writers have tackled the sordid history of race science previously, but none have gone so deep under the skin of the subject as Angela Saini in Superior. In her deceptively relaxed writing style, Saini patiently leads readers through the intellectual minefields of ‘scientific’ racism. She plainly exposes the conscious and unconscious biases that have led even some of our most illustrious scientists astray.”
—Michael Balter, author of The Goddess and the Bull

“In this essential book, Angela Saini deftly shows how science and racism have long been intertwined, why that pernicious history continues to this day, and why ‘race science’ is so deeply flawed. Deeply researched, masterfully written, and sorely needed, Superior is an exceptional work by one of the world’s best science writers.”
—Ed Yong, author of I Contain Multitudes: The Microbes Within Us and a Grander View of Life

“Angela Saini’s Superior: The Return of Race Science is nothing short of a remarkable, brilliant, and erudite exploration of what we believe about the racialized differences among our human bodies. Saini takes readers on a walking tour through science, art, history, geography, nostalgia and personal revelation in order to unpack many of the most urgent debates about human origins, and about the origin myths of racial hierarchies. This beautifully written book will change the way you see the world.”
—Jonathan Metzl, author of Dying of Whiteness

Prologue

CHAPTER 1
Deep Time

CHAPTER 2
It’s a Small World

CHAPTER 3
Scientific Priestcraft

CHAPTER 4
Inside the Fold

CHAPTER 5
Race Realists

CHAPTER 6
Human Biodiversity

CHAPTER 7
Roots

CHAPTER 8
Origin Stories

CHAPTER 9
Caste

CHAPTER 10
The Illusionists

CHAPTER 11
Black Pills

Afterword
Acknowledgments
References
Index