Race, Colour and the Processes of Racialization

New Perspectives from Group Analysis, Psychoanalysis and Sociology

Farhad Dalal

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2013
• ISBN:
  9781134945498
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Psychologie
• Subtopic: Psychanalyse

Is racial conflict determined by biology or society?
So many conflicts appear to be caused by racial and ethnic differences; for example, the cities of Britain and America are regularly affected by race riots. It is argued by socio-biologists and some schools of psychoanalysis that our instincts are programmed to hate those different to us by evolutionary and developmental mechanisms. This book argues against this line, proposing an alternative drawing on insights from diverse disciplines including anthropology, social psychology and linguistics, to give power-relations a critical explanatory role in the generation of hatreds. Farhad Dalal argues that people differentiate between races in order to make a distinction between the 'haves' and 'must-not-haves', and that this process is cognitive, emotional and political rather than biological. Examining the subject over the past thousand years, Race, Colour and the Processes of Racialisation covers:
* psychoanalytic and other theories of racism
* a new theorisation of racism based on group analytic theory
* a general theory of difference based on the works of Fanon, Elias, Matte-Blanco and Foulkes
* application of this theory to race and racism.
Farhad Dalal concludes that the structures of society are reflected in the structures of the psyche, and both of these are colour coded. This book will be invaluable to students, academics and practitioners in the areas of psychoanalysis, group analysis, psychotherapy and counselling.

Chapter 1

Rethinking race

If one supposes that racism is predicated on the idea of race, then before embarking on the main subject, racism, one is compelled to begin with a prior question ‘what is race?’ But as we proceed it will be discovered that it will not be possible to remain with this neat arrangement of race before racism, and this discovery in turn will shed light on the nature of racism itself.

The answers to this question are wide ranging and disagree with each other to an extraordinary degree. However, it is possible to broadly group the types of answer under two headings: those that think race a biological category, an aspect of nature and therefore found by looking, and those that think of it as a reification, a discursive category and an aspect of culture. This way of dividing is not to imply that there is a coherent view within each of the divides.

Norbert Elias says that ideas do not pit themselves one against the other in any pure objective fashion; competing ways of describing the world are also aspects of competitions taking place in the socio-political arena at all sorts of levels. Particularly with the notion of race, the various descriptions are not only competing ways of describing the world, they are also ways of appropriating the world by legitimizing certain actions within it. Whether it is real or not, race is certainly used as a descriptor of peoples and as such has enormous impact on the lives of peoples. The different types of descriptions have led, at the formal level, to different types of social policy as enshrined in government legislation on immigration (Gould 1984), at the more informal and casual level to the killing of a young black man at a bus stop in London, and also at a less explicit level, that is harder to grasp, in the everyday relations between people and their attitude to the world.

What is race?

Whatever race is, the term is used to sort varieties of humankinds. Implicit in this possibility is the apparent truism that there are indeed different kinds of humans to be sorted. Folk psychology and the popular imagination would balk at the use of the term ‘apparent’ and say that the varieties of humankinds are clearly self-evident and plainly there for all to see – the African, the Caucasian, the Asian and so on. In contrast to this folk-psychological view, there is an established body of scientific evidence that demonstrates that the notion of race is one with no empirical substance. All attempts at measuring or naming differences by which the races may be differentiated have been found to be wanting. Indeed, as the modern genetic project is showing that ‘patterns of genetic variation that appear at the genetic level cut across visible racial divides’ (Gutin 1994: 73, italics added). These kinds of findings have led Rustin (1991: 57) to say that ‘“race” is an empty category’ which is filled with different sorts of projection.

It would, however, be a mistake to think that the notion of race has lost all scientific credibility; it retains considerable status not only in psychoanalysis but also in academic psychology. The arguments that the anthropologist M.G. Smith employs to defend the notion of race are not dissimilar to the common-sense arguments of folk psychology. This common-sense account is important because it is representative of the view held by many clinicians (see Chapter 3). Smith says

Race is an essentially biological concept based on those distinctive sets of hereditary phenotypical features that distinguish varieties of mankind. … Those gross hereditary physical differences that all men remark between Negroes, Asiatic Mongols, Whites … [are] objective and genetic in their base. … When couples of the same race, whatever that be, produce children who are randomly black, white, pygmoid etc. I shall gladly acknowledge my error in disputing current biological ideology on the ‘non existence of races’. … Jersey cattle do not bring forth Angus or Friesian calves … must we nonetheless deny the objective differences between these differing breeds, varieties or races of animals because each contain some genetic variation?

(Smith 1988: 189–190)

This is a good example as it encapsulates many of the tautologies inherent in racialized¹ thinking. The kernel of Smith’s argument is that creatures that have similar physical attributes (similar phenotypes) will produce offspring that tend to look similar to them. This indeed is true – my disagreement with him begins with what he proceeds to do with this information. He uses this local familial information to infer something general and universal: that these lineages constitute races. One of the first questions to be put here is how different does one have to be before one is classified as being of a different race? And a sub-question: what sorts of differences will be used to classify races?

Let us pursue the logic of his argument to see where it leads.² If one were to take a particular species, say dogs, then if one were to look at them with an unprejudiced eye (if such a thing were possible) then we would not see ‘types’ but creatures with a range of variations that are actually on a spectrum. To be more precise if we use any one attribute, say the length of the ear, to line up the dogs, they would be arranged in a particular order. If we were then to chose another attribute, say ratio of height to length, then they would be ordered differently. Creatures that were neighbours in the first line-up will not necessarily be neighbours in the second.

But Smith is saying that Alsatian dogs give forth other Alsatian dogs, therefore they constitute a ‘race’. And that if an Alsatian is mated with a Labrador then the outcome would be a ‘mixed race’ or a ‘mixed breed’. But here is the tautology: the notion of mixed breed is predicated on the notion of a pure breed. The fact that Alsatians breeding with Alsatians give forth animals that are also called Alsatians gives Smith the illusion that they constitute a ‘race’. If we ask how are we to know if an animal is a pure breed, there are two sorts of answers that are given. First, we are referred to history. If the parents of the offspring are deemed to be pure by dint of certificates and so forth, then the offspring is deemed to be pure too. This answer is no answer because all it does is move the problem up one generation. Second, there are institutions that designate and legislate what constitutes the elements of a pure breed – colouring, shape, size and so on. Creatures that do not fit in are by definition not pure. This too is a tautology.

For the sake of argument let us name this mixed-breed dog Rover. Now, Rovers who mate with other dogs that look like Rovers will give forth offspring that look like Rovers, and there is nothing remarkable in this. Presumably if this type of dog were deemed to be desirable then eventually over time they too would be deemed to be a breed in their own right. In effect, demand will have manufactured and invented a breed.

We can see then that the notion of a pure race or breed is a reification. The so-called breeds are constructions and not facts of nature. To put it another way, the significance of Alsatians over that of Rovers is only that which is attributed to it.

Before moving on we have to take up one more of Smith’s points. When he asserts that all men remark upon the gross hereditary physical differences between Negroes, Asiatic Mongols, etc., he is asserting that the ‘types’ of human beings are self-evidently present. There are several responses to be made here.

First, psychologists conducting experiments have shown how we constantly and inadvertently introduce discontinuities into continuities; and having done so our perceptual tendency is to experience the resulting situation in such a way that the differences within groups are diminished, whilst the differences between the groups are increased (Tajfel 1981: 150).

Second, as Cohen argues ‘Visibility is socially constructed and can change over time’ (1988: 14). In other words we are taught to see particular differences as meaningful. This is in contrast to Jordan (1977) who supposes that the differences between types of people are self-evidently visible because they exist out there as a fact of nature, and so some differences ‘naturally’ strike one more forcefully than others.

The findings of psychologists concern the mechanism of cognition, and so in a sense where the discontinuities are made are logically arbitrary. But what the socio-political perspective adds is the idea that the place where these ruptures are inserted are not at all arbitrary but socio-politically meaningful. After all, it cannot be coincidental that the colour lines drawn to name the races matched so exactly the power relations during the epoch of colonialism. The most impressive of these being the great divide between the colonizer and the colonized, which fell neatly onto those designated as white and the rest, i.e. the coloured, the black.

This then takes us to the third response which takes up the variety of the kinds of differences that Smith uses to name the races – Negroes (some kind of racial type), Asiatic Mongols (a mix of geography and type), and white (colour). This lack of consistency is a clue to what is going on. Thomas and Sillen (1979: 26) quote Washburn as saying ‘the number of races will depend on the purpose of the classification’. The reasons for the tenacity of the notion of race is something that needs to be explained. It is clear that races per se, as biological facts, do not exist. But having said that, I am then faced with the embarrassing difficulty that like M.G. Smith above, I find that I apparently ‘naturally’ see, experience and name varieties of humankinds, particularly the ones known as black and white. And, worse, despite all my objective belief systems I find myself at times having reactions and fantasies that would definitely be described as racist. The point of revealing this personal detail is not a prelude to using the book as a confessional. Rather, it is to make the point that something complex is going on, something social, something categorical, something emotional.

In order to help contextualize the current debate around the notion of race, there follows a brief history of the emergence of the idea of race in the English-speaking world. This will not be attempted in any detailed way, as it has already been done well by several others, for example Jordan (1977), Gould (1984), Fryer (1984) and Banton (1987).

An overview of the history and use of race

The term race made its first appearance in the English language in 1508 in a poem by William Dunbar (Husband 1982). For the next 300 years or so, prior to the advent of the science of race, the term race appears as a generalized descriptive category in the informal discourse of travellers’ tales. However, its appearance is rare, much more frequent are references to blackes, Moores, Negroes, apes, Aethiopes and the like, attached to whom were the attributes of devilishness, monstrousness, lasciviousness, debauchery, and so on. Similarly, terms most prevalent in the discourses of plantocracy racism are Ethyopians, Blacks, Tawnes, Devils, Beasts, Savages, Negros, etc. The consistent use of the term race commences later, in the eighteenth century (Fryer 1984: 135–146).

Racism before race

For our purposes the main thing to note is that in this earlier period the term race is hardly used, and yet the descriptions are clearly what we would call racist. Thus despite my attempt to be logical and examine the notion of race before that of racism, it appears that racism manifested itself before the invention of race. Or to put it another way, racism did not have to make recourse to a notion of race to activate itself as it had other tools at its disposal. I would explain this in the following way.

In the earlier period ‘the Negro’ and various ‘Others’ were not as yet admitted into the category of humankinds, and this allowed them to be treated as beasts. Over time, the progressive collapse of this division under the weight of accumulating evidence, leads to the Negro gaining entry into the category humankind. It is at this moment that the notion of race becomes necessary as the new means of keeping a distance between the ‘us’ and the ‘them’. So now whilst ground is reluctantly given in admitting that Negroes are human, it is asserted that they are a different kind of human -a different race – and so their exploitation can be continued as before. However, although human now, the associations with bestiality are retained, so that they are a bestial human race. Thus we can see that the division of humankind into races, bolstered by ‘science’, is in a sense a fall-back position.

It will be shown that the movement did not stop here. As the notion of race is progressively found wanting, then the conceptual ground shifts again and now the rationalization for the ‘natural’ antipathy retrenches itself in notions of culture and ethnicity (Barker 1981). Finally then, when the sociobiologists proscribe a genetic basis for both culture and ethnicity we can see that nothing much has changed. So, despite being called other names, this particular rose smells no sweeter.

Many, including elements of the black nationalist movements, would strongly contest this sort of assertion. They would argue that modern racism is particular and specific, and so different in kind from what has gone before, and also different in kind from the dynamics around other sorts of divisions – gender, class, and so on. They argue that racism proper begins with the scientification of race. Whilst I would agree that something specifically different is happening in modernity, I think the critical thing is the functions that the notions of race serve. This function is the naturalization of power relations by retaining the divisions of humankind. It seems to me that in different contexts the logic of the situation calls forth different instruments of differentiation, be they class, blood, gender, whatever, but that these are secondary to the purpose they are put to.³ In saying this I am anticipating some of what will be elaborated on at a later stage. The point to be noted for the moment is that something that looks like racism has manifested itself without necessarily making recourse to a notion of race. C.J. Robinson would concur with this idea in general, although he also argues that racism and race had their genesis in the ‘internal’ relations of European peoples. He says

At the very beginnings of European civilisation (meaning literally the reappearance of urban life at the end of the first Christian millennium) the integration of the Germanic migrants with older European peoples resulted in a social order of domination from which a racial theory of order emerged … positing distinct racial origins for rulers and the dominated. The extension of slavery and the application of racism to non-European peoples as an organising structure … retained this practical habit, this social convention

(Robinson 1983: 83)

Miles (1993) and Cohen (1988) also argue that the advent of racism cannot be completely explained through the project of European colonialism because it fails to account for the racism in Europe prior to that, particularly anti-Semitism. The discourse of ‘blood’ uses a different language and has a different emphasis to that of race, but they both work for the same master – the explanation for the division of humanity into the haves and the must-not-haves.

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