The Skull Measurers Mistake: And Other Portraits of Men and Women Who Spoke Out Against Racism

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In 1981, Stephen Jay Gould exposed the bad science behind nineteenth-century American studies that "proved" that Anglo-Saxons were superior because they had larger brains. In The Skull Measurer's Mistake, Sven Lindqvist tells the story of Friedrich Tiedemann, the nineteenth-century German doctor who dared to speak out against such racist science when it was first practiced.

Often the history of racism is reduced to the study of racists. Less well known are the stories of those who argued and fought against prejudice and persecution. In this unique book, Sven Lindqvist, Swedish author of internationally acclaimed books on Africa, China, and Latin America, profiles more than twenty nineteenth-century men and women who, while not themselves victims of racism, went against the temper of the time to expose the many faces of prejudice.

Along with Tiedemann's story, The Skull Measurer's Mistake recounts the antiracist efforts of Benjamin Franklin, Helen Hunt, Joseph Conrad, Alexis de Tocqueville, and others whose names have been forgotten. Well-documented and rich in anecdote, Lindqvist's book shows how racist arguments emergedand reemergedover time. At the book's core is Lindqvist's belief that knowledge of past debates about racism can help us defeat it now.

Reviews

Praise forSkull Measurers Mistake:
[A] unique and groundbreaking book . . . [which] should form part of everyones intellectual armory.
Richard Gott, former literary editor of The Guardian

Lindqvist is a courageous, subtle thinker and a dogged researcher . . . [who writes about] systems of oppression with subtlety and force.
Washington City Paper

These original sources can help students understand past debates about racist institutions such as slavery and anti-immigration laws and give insight as to how to argue against racist perspectives today.
Rethinking Schools

This is a useful, unpretentious volume that may give context and hope to the fight against racism.
Kirkus Reviews

Author Bio

Sven Lindqvist was the author of more than thirty books, including Exterminate All the Brutes, The Skull Measurers Mistake, A History of Bombing, Terra Nullius, and The Dead Do Not Die. A resident of Stockholm, he held a PhD in the history of literature from Stockholm University, an honorary doctorate from Uppsala University, and an honorary professorship from the Swedish government.