Racism and Philosophy

By establishing that racism has broad implications for how the entire field of philosophy is practised - and by whom - this work seeks to warn members of the discipline that racism concerns them. It simultaneously demonstrates to race theorists the significance of philosophy for their work. The contributing authors focus on the insights that analyses of race and racism can make to philosophy - not just to ethics and political philosophy but also to the more abstract debates of metaphysics, philosophy of mind and epistemology. Contemporary philosophy, the authors argue, continues to evade racism and, as a result, often helps to promote it. At the same time, anti-racist theorists in many disciplines regularly draw on crucial notions of objectivity, rationality, agency, individualism and truth without adequate knowledge of philosophical analyses of these very concepts. The text seeks to demonstrate the impossibility of talking thoughtfully about race without recourse to philosophy.