Scan barcode
Reviews
The Invention of Humanity: Equality and Cultural Difference in World History by Siep Stuurman
nick_jenkins's review against another edition
4.0
There is no other book that does what this book tries to do: to tell a global history of ideas about the unity of the human race. The breadth which this requires is astonishing; the organized rigor which it necessitates is formidable.
The book is unique in two ways. First, most books which cover a similar topic do so from a very different angle. Many choose to trace the origins and development of ideas about inequality, generally in terms of race. Or they channel ideas about equality through its political forms, usually in terms of the spread of democracy or the articulation of the principle of human rights. Stuurman's subject is more expansive and more diffuse. More expansive because he considers three axes of difference: religious, gender, and racial. More diffuse because equality does not mean just political equality but something more holistic, more in line with anthropology as Antenor Firmin defined it: "the study of Man in his [sic] physical, moral, and intellectual dimensions, as he is found among the different races that make up the human species" (quoted on page 428).
Second, the book attempts to be a genuinely global history, not merely a comparative history of ideas or a pseudo-global history that sprinkles a basically Western history with a few token Asian or African thinkers. Stuurman thinks continuously about the global ramifications of new ideas, and he fully incorporates the insights of many historians of empire who have demonstrated the complex circuitry of intellectual activity between core and periphery. Neither the imperial periphery nor the metropolitan core has had a monopoly on intellectual innovation, and many conceptual breakthroughs have emerged in the process of either physical travel from one to the other or imaginative exploration, as metropolitan intellectuals find the periphery useful to think with (or vice versa).
The book's scope does present some (likely insoluble) problems. Readings of specific texts can end up perfunctory and the conclusions Stuurman draws from them can be a bit repetitive, but these flaws are clearly the consequences of attempting to cover so much territory while maintaining a conceptual framework that is simple enough to be consistent over so many centuries of material. If that is the price to be paid for such an expansive and inclusive history, it is an incredible bargain.
The book is unique in two ways. First, most books which cover a similar topic do so from a very different angle. Many choose to trace the origins and development of ideas about inequality, generally in terms of race. Or they channel ideas about equality through its political forms, usually in terms of the spread of democracy or the articulation of the principle of human rights. Stuurman's subject is more expansive and more diffuse. More expansive because he considers three axes of difference: religious, gender, and racial. More diffuse because equality does not mean just political equality but something more holistic, more in line with anthropology as Antenor Firmin defined it: "the study of Man in his [sic] physical, moral, and intellectual dimensions, as he is found among the different races that make up the human species" (quoted on page 428).
Second, the book attempts to be a genuinely global history, not merely a comparative history of ideas or a pseudo-global history that sprinkles a basically Western history with a few token Asian or African thinkers. Stuurman thinks continuously about the global ramifications of new ideas, and he fully incorporates the insights of many historians of empire who have demonstrated the complex circuitry of intellectual activity between core and periphery. Neither the imperial periphery nor the metropolitan core has had a monopoly on intellectual innovation, and many conceptual breakthroughs have emerged in the process of either physical travel from one to the other or imaginative exploration, as metropolitan intellectuals find the periphery useful to think with (or vice versa).
The book's scope does present some (likely insoluble) problems. Readings of specific texts can end up perfunctory and the conclusions Stuurman draws from them can be a bit repetitive, but these flaws are clearly the consequences of attempting to cover so much territory while maintaining a conceptual framework that is simple enough to be consistent over so many centuries of material. If that is the price to be paid for such an expansive and inclusive history, it is an incredible bargain.
nick_jenkins's review
4.0
There is no other book that does what this book tries to do: to tell a global history of ideas about the unity of the human race. The breadth which this requires is astonishing; the organized rigor which it necessitates is formidable.
The book is unique in two ways. First, most books which cover a similar topic do so from a very different angle. Many choose to trace the origins and development of ideas about inequality, generally in terms of race. Or they channel ideas about equality through its political forms, usually in terms of the spread of democracy or the articulation of the principle of human rights. Stuurman's subject is more expansive and more diffuse. More expansive because he considers three axes of difference: religious, gender, and racial. More diffuse because equality does not mean just political equality but something more holistic, more in line with anthropology as Antenor Firmin defined it: "the study of Man in his [sic] physical, moral, and intellectual dimensions, as he is found among the different races that make up the human species" (quoted on page 428).
Second, the book attempts to be a genuinely global history, not merely a comparative history of ideas or a pseudo-global history that sprinkles a basically Western history with a few token Asian or African thinkers. Stuurman thinks continuously about the global ramifications of new ideas, and he fully incorporates the insights of many historians of empire who have demonstrated the complex circuitry of intellectual activity between core and periphery. Neither the imperial periphery nor the metropolitan core has had a monopoly on intellectual innovation, and many conceptual breakthroughs have emerged in the process of either physical travel from one to the other or imaginative exploration, as metropolitan intellectuals find the periphery useful to think with (or vice versa).
The book's scope does present some (likely insoluble) problems. Readings of specific texts can end up perfunctory and the conclusions Stuurman draws from them can be a bit repetitive, but these flaws are clearly the consequences of attempting to cover so much territory while maintaining a conceptual framework that is simple enough to be consistent over so many centuries of material. If that is the price to be paid for such an expansive and inclusive history, it is an incredible bargain.
The book is unique in two ways. First, most books which cover a similar topic do so from a very different angle. Many choose to trace the origins and development of ideas about inequality, generally in terms of race. Or they channel ideas about equality through its political forms, usually in terms of the spread of democracy or the articulation of the principle of human rights. Stuurman's subject is more expansive and more diffuse. More expansive because he considers three axes of difference: religious, gender, and racial. More diffuse because equality does not mean just political equality but something more holistic, more in line with anthropology as Antenor Firmin defined it: "the study of Man in his [sic] physical, moral, and intellectual dimensions, as he is found among the different races that make up the human species" (quoted on page 428).
Second, the book attempts to be a genuinely global history, not merely a comparative history of ideas or a pseudo-global history that sprinkles a basically Western history with a few token Asian or African thinkers. Stuurman thinks continuously about the global ramifications of new ideas, and he fully incorporates the insights of many historians of empire who have demonstrated the complex circuitry of intellectual activity between core and periphery. Neither the imperial periphery nor the metropolitan core has had a monopoly on intellectual innovation, and many conceptual breakthroughs have emerged in the process of either physical travel from one to the other or imaginative exploration, as metropolitan intellectuals find the periphery useful to think with (or vice versa).
The book's scope does present some (likely insoluble) problems. Readings of specific texts can end up perfunctory and the conclusions Stuurman draws from them can be a bit repetitive, but these flaws are clearly the consequences of attempting to cover so much territory while maintaining a conceptual framework that is simple enough to be consistent over so many centuries of material. If that is the price to be paid for such an expansive and inclusive history, it is an incredible bargain.
More...