Читать книгу Race - Paul C. Taylor - Страница 13

I’ve said little to this point about anything apart from words, terms, and concepts. You may be wondering what happened to the things we call races. When do we talk about them?

In order to do the work of this book, which does, trust me, involve examining the entities we call races, I’ll need to find the lowest common denominator for the various dialects of race-talk. I’ll need to find the conceptual role that “race” plays at various sites, including at the opposed sites from which we receive the specific dogmas of Klan-style racism and the critical reactions of anti-racist racialists. Once we identify the core meanings that link these two extremes, we’ll be able to see the disagreement between them as a disagreement about the same subject. This will leave us in a better position to evaluate race-thinking as a resource, instrument, or tool that can be used for good or for ill.

All of this is to say: we can’t talk meaningfully about the things that words like “race” denote until we get clear on, well, just what the words denote. The concept of race, like all concepts, is a lens that we use to examine certain aspects of reality; and when you’re using things with lenses, whether they’re telescopes, cameras, or conceptual frames, it’s important to be clear about the condition of the apparatus before making judgments about whatever the apparatus shows you. Once we know a bit more about the racial discourse lens, then we can ask whether the subjects of that discourse actually exist, whether we’d be better off not talking about them even if they do exist, and so on.