Manual of Civil Law: For the Use of Schools, and More Especially of Candidates for Civil Service (1856)

Nineteenth-century French scholars, during a turbulent era of revolution and industrialization, ranked intelligence and character according to facial profile, skin colour, and head shape. They believed that such indicators could determine whether individuals were educable and peoples perfectible. In Labeling People Martin Staum examines the Paris societies of phrenology (reading intelligence and character by head shapes), geography, and ethnology and their techniques for classifying people. He shows how the work of these social scientists gave credence to the arrangement of races in a hierarchy, the domination of non-European peoples, and the limitation of opportunities for ill-favored individuals within France.