Constructing race and rehearsing imperialism : German anthropologies of the Philippines, 1859 to 1885

Weston, Nathaniel Parker

Constructing race and rehearsing imperialism : German anthropologies of the Philippines, 1859 to 1885

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Weston, N. Constructing race and rehearsing imperialism : German anthropologies of the Philippines, 1859 to 1885. 2020. url: http://www.raco.cat/index.php/Entremons/article/view/375465

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Abstract

This article argues that anthropology created in precolonial Germany rehearsed and reinforced imperialism by constructing portraits of colonized Filipinos as racially inferior. Before the unification of Imperial Germany in 1871 and up to its acquisition of overseas colonies in 1884, several German anthropologists traveled through colonies in Africa, Asia, and the Pacific Islands, amassing artifacts, human remains, and photographs that were essential for their studies. They subsequently used these sources to assemble racial categories asserting that colonized peoples lacked civilization. This article examines the example of German anthropologies of the Philippines under Spanish rule during the second half of the nineteenth century. German participation in colonial projects, particularly those involving racial ideologies, therefore lasted for a longer duration than the period in which Imperial Germany ruled directly over territories abroad.