The study of human diversity and subsequent racialization of people has been examined and critiqued but has escaped interrogation as an institution by which structural violence is enacted. Works such as Is Science Racist? (2017) by Jonathan Marks has evaluated science as a means of reproducing culturally held racist beliefs and justifying subordination through cultural violence but fails to examine the various types of harm actually produced by science. While this difference appears subtle, it is necessary to treat science as an institution through which structural violence is carried out. Institutions such as healthcare and education have been scrutinized as structures of power that structural violence can act through, but these are merely actors reproducing ideas made through scientific inquiry and given power through scientific authority. Furthermore, the adoption and implementation of scientific ideas by other social institutions not only justify but maintain social class hierarchy.

Science can be thought of as three related entities: as a method by which we produce knowledge about the natural world, as a pool of knowledge concerning the natural world, and as a social institution with the goal of producing knowledge about the natural world. In its institutional form, it is treated as disinterested, and its only purpose is to uncover truth and disseminate that to institutions that can put the research to work. Therefore, the products of science are seen as objective. However, science is highly biopolitical; that is, it grants social and political power over life—in this case, Black bodies. The fetishization of science allows hegemonic ideas of White supremacy to be reproduced, justified, and adopted by other social institutions in a nearly unquestioning manner.

Books such as The Bell Curve (1994) and the ‘genohype’ surrounding the Human Genome Project’s ‘pronouncement of genetic destiny’⁴¹ presented one’s genotype—the genetic makeup of a person—as one’s true self. This portrayal goes beyond the structural level to the very ontology of people. There was hope that the Human Genome Project could elucidate a more scientific conception of race that did not merely rely on skin color but could be seen in our genetic code (Patrinos 2004). While it failed to do so, the commodification of genomes through for-profit genetics testing services like 23andMe and Ancestry.com continues to rely on the belief that our very being- who we are—is located in our genetic sequence.⁴² The scientific rhetoric in every case serves to set people apart from one another and into categories that we already hold as culturally relevant—races.

Throughout science, there has been a shift in ideology as theory and practice incorporate the social components of race and de-essentialize genetics as the determinant cause of socioeconomic inequality. Research across many fields, including anthropology, sociology, education, and psychology, demonstrates that much of the data used to argue for intrinsic differences between Black and White people can be accounted for by merely incorporating socioeconomic class in the equation. However, centuries of racialized science have had lingering effects on the kinds of questions asked and still color many of the assumptions during research. Despite understanding race as a biocultural construction, scientists insist on continuing to use race as a framework for understanding education and health disparities in lieu of a more intersectional approach, incorporating class, gender, etc.

Furthermore, the colonization of the Black genome—which is itself constructed in opposition to the White genome—is internalized as genes are valued as predictors and determinants of nearly all aspects of one’s life. For instance, among those surveyed by Shostak et al.,⁴³ both Blacks and Whites believed that genetics were either very important or somewhat important for intelligence, personality, and success in life at >60 percent. This indicates that cultural beliefs concerning race and genetics, when reproduced with scientific authority, are primed to be adopted into the public psyche. Althusser introduces the concept of interpellation to describe the way by which ideology recruits or transforms subjects.⁴⁴ Cultural ideology, given power through structural legitimization, ‘recruits subjects’, and the hegemonic notion of intrinsic difference results in an asymmetrical social value, which is then internalized. The subsequent internalization of inscribed value, and thus a relative place in society, is an avenue by which racism can act, thus maintaining a race-divided class structure by equivalating race to ability and ability to class. This can explain why the survey data of Shostak et al. demonstrates pervasive belief among Americans of the efficacy of genetic determinism. With so many adhering to this notion, White-dominated power is supported by its purported intrinsic superiority.

Geno-colonisation

While science has shaped social institutions such as healthcare and education, it also has a direct influence on society and thus is able to enact structural violence through the legitimization of racist, culturally pervasive beliefs. These beliefs and subsequent validity- conferred by science- then become internalized; that is, the belief that there are demonstrable differences in ability between Blacks and Whites becomes incorporated into the self of individuals belonging to these groups. This serves as a tool for maintaining hegemonic control without needing to utilize direct violence; people are expected to accept their lot in life if it is out of their control. It alleviates responsibility from the state and instead places it on the individual.

As genetics gained legitimacy in the scientific community, new avenues were opened to justifying socioeconomic inequality that is unduly drawn along racial boundaries. This is not to say that all White people occupy a place higher on the socioeconomic hierarchy but that a trend exists, and it is supported by over a century of scientific authority. However, this contributes to the creation of a ‘new bio-underclass’;⁴⁵ a class predominantly occupied by Black Americans, whose membership is claimed to be the result of an inferior genetic makeup. Furthermore, any attempt to correct this by addressing structural ills will fail because the real cause is seen as innate.^{46, 47}

What is occurring is geno-colonisation: the process by which value and meaning are projected onto the genome of another group for the purpose of reifying political power. Here, colonizing refers to the process by which structures of power establish political control over an ‘othered’ group. Historically, Black bodies have been colonized; Africans were enslaved and used as mere machines for the economic benefit of the ruling class—robbed of their Humanity and consideration as members of society. Beyond the literal colonization of Black bodies, they were also colonized by the hegemonic ideology of the ruling class. This can be seen best seen in the racist scientific research since Blumenbach first introduced race as a unit of inquiry. Throughout the period of racialized science—which still somewhat continues today- a central goal was to demonstrate that Blacks and Whites were fundamentally different biologically, and these differences served as a ready explanation of why Whites dominated the highest levels of class hierarchy while Blacks were generally relegated to the lowest.

Black bodies were ideologically colonized by science by researchers such as Samuel Morton and Louis Agassiz. They used craniometry as the primary tool to demonstrate the natural differences between the races. Morton argues that the skulls of Whites had an average cranial capacity of 148 cubic centimeters greater than that of those of Black people.⁴⁸ This result was used to explain the relative difference between Whites and Blacks in intelligence, treating brain size among humans as an indicator of intelligence. Despite this dubious claim, Stephen J. Gould and, later, Michael Weisberg further called into question Morton’s work as an example of racist beliefs tainting the science.^{49, 50} They argue that Morton mismeasured the skulls of Blacks to corroborate the belief that Whites were naturally of greater intelligence.

While this exemplifies the utilization of the institution of science to support White beliefs of their superiority over the Blacks—the colonization of Black bodies by White ideas—craniometry eventually fell out of favor with the introduction of genetics into the exploration of human difference. The study of genetics purported to unlock the very essence of who we are and what makes us us. Our character traits and limitations on our abilities could all be found within our genetic code. Arthur R. Jensen observes that Blacks perform worse on I.Q. tests than Whites and, despite special programs to address this issue, continue to underperform. He then argues that intelligence is highly heritable and, therefore, there’s no use in trying to correct the disparities through special educational programs because it is primarily of genetic cause. Furthermore, abilities that Blacks are biologically adapted to excel in should be cultivated in lieu of intelligence.⁵¹

The parable of Jensen demonstrates geno-colonialism. It is no longer bodies that are of interest- but instead, what is being sold as the very essence of being—genes. White conceptions of Black value are being projected onto the genome of Black people and together serve as a reifying agent for socioeconomic inequality. Due to the social power and authority of science, these beliefs become pervasive and are adopted as ‘obvious’ truths and grounded in ‘objective’ science. This requires three primary assumptions: race functions as a tenable biological category; intelligence is heritable, that is, not a product of social circumstances; and these heritable traits are asymmetrically distributed between races.

The internalization of these reductive beliefs has a profound effect on those colonized. As Speight describes, ‘racism is a process, a condition, a relationship that violates its victims physically, socially, spiritually, materially, and psychologically.’⁵² Institutional racism, given legitimacy through genetic science, cuts to the very core of self. These arguments preclude any hope of social mobility, liberation, or power because they are inhibited by the very nature of existence. To remove any semblance of hope is to create an environment in which unimpeded domination can occur.

Conclusion

Historically, the creation of race has been used to justify, maintain, and enforce social hierarchy. Race and class are inextricable—race exists as a means of domination. The science of humans, since its onset, has carried on this trope, ceding legitimacy to a social structure where one defined racial group can dominate another. Despite the abundance of research demonstrating the nature of race as a biocultural construction in anthropology,⁵³ sociology,⁵⁴ and psychology,⁵⁵ the reductive beliefs concerning the biological ontology of race persist. While intrinsic differences by constructed racial categories are emphasized less frequently today, it has had a spanning effect on American society. Through science, race and class have been naturalized, and the ideological colonization of genes has essentialized inequality, treating it as an insurmountable barrier to social mobility.

Through the essentialisation of inequality and its subsequent internalization, science is carrying out structural violence. Blacks experience harm as their place in the socioeconomic hierarchy is treated as the result of their genes- their essence, and so it is in their nature to constitute the bio-underclass. This has great economic implications because it precludes any structural changes that may alleviate the consequences of vast socioeconomic inequality, such as access to resources, pay, education, and healthcare. By examining science through a lens of structural violence, we can elucidate the mechanisms by which science itself is enacting harm on certain groups of people and then make necessary changes that could have cascading effects. Since science is a foundational institution—that is—much of our beliefs come from or are supported by science, explicitly eliminating race as a biological unit of inquiry and, instead, focusing on the social implications of race and its intersection with other identities (i.e. class, gender, etc.) can facilitate further social change in society.

However, it is important to note that this is likely insufficient for complete liberation as the neo-liberal Capitalistic structure of American society comes with its own attacks on Blackness. The expropriation of Black labor for the financial gains of the upper class and the pitting of members of the working class against one another under the guise of racial or ethnic differences also contravenes the motion toward fairness and justice.^{56, 57} Interrogation of the science’s role in the Capitalist scheme for the extraction of surplus from its constituents by framing it as a social institution through which structural violence works may both eliminate the hegemonic colonization of the constructed Black genome and free science from use as a tool for social domination.

References

1. J. Galtung. ‘Cultural violence,’ Journal of Peace Research 27, no. 3 (1990): pp. 291-305.

2. L. Hirschfeld and H. Hirschfeld. ‘Serological differences between the blood of different races: the result of researches on the Macedonian front’, The Lancet 194, no. 5016 (1919): pp. 675-79.

3. P. Farmer. Pathologies of Power: health, human rights, and the new war on the poor (Berkeley: Univ of California Press, 2004).

4. J. Galtung. ‘Violence, peace, and peace research’, Journal of Peace Research 6, no. 3 (1969): pp. 167-91.

5. P. E. Farmer, B. Nizeye, S. Stulac, and S. Keshavjee. ‘Structural violence and clinical medicine’, PLoS medicine 3, no. 10 (2006): pp. e449.

6. A. Osler. ‘Excluded girls: interpersonal, institutional and structural violence in schooling’, Gender and education 18, no. 6 (2006): pp. 571-89.

7. P. Benson. ‘El campo: faciality and structural violence in farm labor camps’, Cultural Anthropology 23, no. 4 (2008): pp. 589-629.

8. G. M. Fredrickson. Racism: a short history (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2015).

9. A. Smedley and B. D. Smedley. ‘Race as biology is fiction, racism as a social problem is real: Anthropological and historical perspectives on the social construction of race’, American Psychologist 60, no. 1 (2005): pp. 16-26.

10. A. Fuentes. Race, Monogamy, and Other Lies They Told You: busting myths about human nature (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2015).

11. J. M. Marks. Human Biodiversity: genes, race, and history (New Brunswick: Transaction Publishers, 2001).

12. J. H. Relethford. ‘Race and global patterns of phenotypic variation’, American Journal of Physical Anthropology 139, no. 1 (2009): pp. 20.

13. C. C. Gravlee. ‘How race becomes biology: embodiment of social inequality’, American Journal of Physical Anthropology 139, no. 1 (2009): pp. 47-57.

14. J. D. Miller, E. C. Scott, and S. Okamoto. ‘Public Acceptance of Evolution’, Science 313, no. 5788 (2006): pp. 765-66.

15. A. Sivanandan. ‘Poverty is the new black’, Race & Class 43, no. 2 (2001): pp. 1-5.

16. E. Jones. ‘Racism, fines and fees and the US carceral state’, Race & Class (2017): pp. 0306396817734785.

17. C. E. Mills. ‘Framing Ferguson: Fox News and the construction of US racism’, Race & Class 58, no. 4 (2017): pp. 39-56.

18. A. Smedley and B. D. Smedley. ‘Race as biology is fiction, racism as a social problem is real: Anthropological and historical perspectives on the social construction of race’, American Psychologist 60, no. 1 (2005): pp. 16.

19. J. Blumenbach. On the natural varieties of mankind (T. Bendyshe, Trans.) (London: London, Pub. for the Anthropological Society, 1775).

20. D. E. McCoskey. Race: antiquity and its legacy (New York: IB Tauris, 2012).

21. F. A. Hippocrates, Trans. 400 BCE. (Cambridge: MIT Classics, 1994). http://classics.mit.edu/Hippocrates/airwatpl.mb.txt.

22. A. Montagu. The concept of race (New York: Free Press of Glencoe New York, 1964).

23. Aristotle and T. J. Saunders. Politics. Books I and II (New York: Oxford University Press, 1995).

24. Fredrickson. Racism: a short history.

25. B. Lewis. Race and Slavery in the Middle East: an historical enquiry (New York: Oxford University Press, 1992).

26. L. Poliakov. The History of Anti-Semitism (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2003).

27. S. Stuurman. ‘François Bernier and the invention of racial classification’, History Workshop Journal 2000, no. 50 (2000): pp. 1-21.

28. I. Kant. Observations on the Feeling of the Beautiful and Sublime, J. Goldthwait, Trans (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1960), pp. 110-111.

29. C. Linnaeus. ‘Systema naturae, ed. 12, vol. 2’, Laurentii Salvii, Stockholm (1767).

30. W. Stanton. The leopard’s spots: Scientific attitudes toward race in America, 1815-59 (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1960).

31. S. G. Morton. Crania Americana; or, a comparative view of the skulls of various aboriginal nations of North and South America: to which is prefixed an essay on the varieties of the human species (Philadelphia: J. Dobson, 1839), pp. 7.

32. J. C. Nott and G. R. Gliddon. Types of Mankind Or Ethnological Researches, Based Upon the Ancient Monuments, Paintings, Sculptures, and Crania of Races, and Upon Their Natural, Geographical, Phililogical, and Biblical History (Philadelphia: J. B. Lippincott & Co., 1868), pp. 80-81.

33. C. Darwin. On the Origin of Species (New York: P. F. Collier & Son, 1909), pp. 527.

34. C. Darwin. The Descent of Man and Selection in Relation to Sex (London: John Murray, 1896), pp. 618.

35. F. Galton. Hereditary Genius: An inquiry into its laws and consequences (New York: MacMillan and Co., 1892).

36. F. Galton. ‘132. The Possible Improvement of the Human Breed Under the Existing Conditions of Law and Sentiment’, Man 1 (1901): pp. 161-64.

37. Hirschfeld and Hirschfeld. ‘Serological differences between the blood of different races: the result of researches on the Macedonian front’.

38. R. Ottenberg. ‘A classification of human races based on geographic distribution of the blood groups’, Journal of the American Medical Association 84, no. 19 (1925): pp. 1393-95.

39. D. E. Roberts. Killing the black body: Race, reproduction, and the meaning of liberty (New York: Vintage Books, 1998).

40. C. B. Davenport. Heredity in Relation to Eugenics (Covent Garden: Willaims and Norgate, 1912), pp. 239-251.

41. N. A. Holtzman. ‘Are genetic tests adequately regulated?’, Science 286, no. 5439 (1999): pp. 409-09.

42. K. Servick. Can 23andMe have it all? : American Association for the Advancement of Science, 2015.

43. S. Shostak, J. Freese, B. G. Link, and J. C. Phelan. ‘The politics of the gene: Social status and beliefs about genetics for individual outcomes’, Social Psychology Quarterly 72, no. 1 (2009): pp. 77-93.

44. L. Althusser. ‘Ideology and ideological state apparatuses (notes towards an investigation)’, The anthropology of the state: A reader 9, no. 1 (2006): pp. 86-98.

45. Roberts. Killing the black body: Race, reproduction, and the meaning of liberty, pp. 19.

46. R. J. Herrnstein and C. Murray. Bell curve: Intelligence and class structure in American life: Simon and Schuster, 2010).

47. A. Jensen. ‘How much can we boost IQ and scholastic achievement’, Harvard educational review 39, no. 1 (1969): pp. 1-123.

48. S. G. Morton. Crania Americana; or, a comparative view of the skulls of various aboriginal nations of North and South America: to which is prefixed an essay on the varieties of the human species.

49. S. J. Gould. The Mismeasure of Man (New York: WW Norton & Company, 1996).

50. M. Weisberg. ‘Remeasuring man’, Evolution & development 16, no. 3 (2014): pp. 166-78.

51. Jensen. ‘How much can we boost IQ and scholastic achievement’.

52. S. L. Speight. ‘Internalized racism: One more piece of the puzzle’, The Counseling Psychologist 35, no. 1 (2007): pp. 127.

53. Relethford. ‘Race and global patterns of phenotypic variation’.

54. M. Omi and H. Winant. Racial Formation in the United States: From the 1960s to the 1990s (New York: Routledge, 1994).

55. Smedley and Smedley. ‘Race as biology is fiction, racism as a social problem is real: Anthropological and historical perspectives on the social construction of race’.

56. M. Marable. How capitalism underdeveloped Black America: Problems in race, political economy, and society: Haymarket Books, 2015).

57. Sivanandan. ‘Poverty is the new black’.