Kenan Malik

Strange Fruit

Race has always been a highly contentious issue. In Strange Fruit: Why Both Sides are Wrong in the Race Debate Kenan Malik argues that it is also a very muddled issue.

Whether race is a meaningful concept at all is a debatable issue, but Malik argues that it may be useful in some circumstances, such as the initial diagnosis and treatment of medical conditions. It should not, however, be used to define a person's identity. Such a definition has been at the base of policies of segregation, but it is also being supported by some in the anti-racist movement. What is scary is how eager people seem to accept this, on the basis of very weak correlations in scientific studies, of the campaigning of a few activists and of 'postmodern' arguments which would fall apart if you took them seriously.

This book is a contender for the 2009 Royal Society Prize for Science Books, but it wouldn't be my choice for the title, as I feel it leaves something to be desired as a science book. An author such as Stephen J Gould would be more likely to try to sort out the muddle, whilst Malik is content just to highlight it. Also, I thought that he missed some opportunities for highlighting the contradictions in thoughts about race. However, I still feel that it is well worth reading as a timely warning of where some current racial policies may be leading.

Amazon.com info

Paperback 341 pages
ISBN: 1851686657
Salesrank: 353482
Weight:0.84 lbs

Published: 2009 Oneworld Publications

Amazon price $12.44

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Amazon.co.uk info

Hardcover 288 pages
ISBN: 185168588X
Salesrank: 390214
Weight:1.2 lbs

Published: 2008 Oneworld Publications

Amazon price £14.49

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Amazon.ca info

Hardcover 288 pages
ISBN: 185168588X
Salesrank: 454440
Weight:1.2 lbs

Published: 2008 Oneworld Publications

Amazon price CDN$ 24.95

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Product Description
Debates about race are back and they're only getting bigger. There has recently been a massive upsurge in scientific racial research. The US government has licensed a heart drug to be used only on African Americans. A genetic study claims that Jews are more intelligent because their history of financial occupations favored genes associated with cleverness. Malik argues that this rise in racial ideas is paradoxically due to the efforts of liberal anti-racism.

Product Description

Debates about race are back and they're only getting bigger. There has recently been a massive upsurge in scientific racial research. The US government has licensed a heart drug to be used only on African Americans. A genetic study claims that Jews are more intelligent because their history of financial occupations favored genes associated with cleverness. Malik argues that this rise in racial ideas is paradoxically due to the efforts of liberal anti-racism.

A very clear and readable study *****
I don't have any specialist knowledge of the topic, but this certainly seemed a good overview of some of the debates surrounding race. Malik writes calmly and logically about the relationship between medicine/illness and `race', and seeks to demonstrate that some aspects of `antiracism' and multiculturalism can be seen as allied to, rather than distinct from, racism. Malik concludes with a critique of studies such as `The Bell Curve' which find a correlation between race and intelligence. I would have liked more still on this latter topic in fact. Sometimes I found myself thinking Malik almost too reasonable and logical - but I guess that's an error in the right direction.

A very clear and readable study *****

I don't have any specialist knowledge of the topic, but this certainly seemed a good overview of some of the debates surrounding race. Malik writes calmly and logically about the relationship between medicine/illness and `race', and seeks to demonstrate that some aspects of `antiracism' and multiculturalism can be seen as allied to, rather than distinct from, racism. Malik concludes with a critique of studies such as `The Bell Curve' which find a correlation between race and intelligence. I would have liked more still on this latter topic in fact. Sometimes I found myself thinking Malik almost *too* reasonable and logical - but I guess that's an error in the right direction.

Should be read by every politician and journalist *****
This is the best book I have read covering a wide range of arguments concerning race. Malik reveals deep flaws in the arguments of both the race deniers and the race warriers. Rather than dismiss the concept out of hand he shows what the limits of its applicability should be. There are differences, for example, in the responsiveness of different human groups to different medicines. Even here, however he warns that these differences are not quite what they are usually thought to be. Thus sickle cell anaemia is not a black problem since the majority of blacks do not suffer from it. Furthermore some whites have the problem. Malik piles up a lot of detail on such issues and shows that only careful analysis which is not driven by dogmatic concepts of race (for or against). The middle section of the book details the changing approaches to race since the Englightenment and should convince anyone who think that goodies and badies can be lined up by their response to simple questions that things are far more complicated than they imagine. Finally in the last part of the book Malik shows who simplistic anti-racism has resulted in policies that reinforce racist views and inter-community problems. The book is well researched and carefully argued. It should be read by every politician an journalist who is in any way concerned with issues of race.

Should be read by every politician and journalist *****

This is the best book I have read covering a wide range of arguments concerning race. Malik reveals deep flaws in the arguments of both the race deniers and the race warriers. Rather than dismiss the concept out of hand he shows what the limits of its applicability should be. There are differences, for example, in the responsiveness of different human groups to different medicines. Even here, however he warns that these differences are not quite what they are usually thought to be. Thus sickle cell anaemia is not a black problem since the majority of blacks do not suffer from it. Furthermore some whites have the problem. Malik piles up a lot of detail on such issues and shows that only careful analysis which is not driven by dogmatic concepts of race (for or against).
The middle section of the book details the changing approaches to race since the Englightenment and should convince anyone who think that goodies and badies can be lined up by their response to simple questions that things are far more complicated than they imagine.
Finally in the last part of the book Malik shows who simplistic anti-racism has resulted in policies that reinforce racist views and inter-community problems.
The book is well researched and carefully argued. It should be read by every politician an journalist who is in any way concerned with issues of race.

A third way *****
Malik begins with a discussion of race from a biological point of view. He clearly tends towards the fashionable viewpoint that race is not a valid biological concept, and seems to wish to perpetuate Lewontin's Fallacy. Although Malik demonstrates that there are indeed immense and apparently insurmountable difficulties in defining exactly what 'race' is, I don't feel that his argument that as a result the concept is invalid is conclusive. Just because we are unable to define such a concept rigorously doesn't mean that such categories can't exist at all, even in some fuzzy or naive sense. It feels a little like saying that life does not exist, because we haven't been able to agree upon a rigorous definition of what life is. Life clearly does exist, despite our failure to define it. Malik progresses onto a discussion of European racism during the empire building and colonial period. One important part of his treatment which I think still has great relevance today, is how Europeans of the time had a tendency to treat black people who took part in the norms of European society as equals. Dress like us, speak like us, behave like us, we treat you exactly like one of us. What people call "racism" is actually more often "culturalism" as it were, and I think that this is very much the case in modern society. Moving from the past to the present, Malik analyses the anti-racist movements of the modern day, and demonstrates how things have swung to the opposite pole entirely. Whereas 'racist' imperialist Europe allowed other races to become one of them by behaving like them, contemporary politically correct anti-racist movements do exactly the opposite. They do not even permit black people to behave like white people; on the contrary it is about white people telling black people how they must behave and actually confining them within a certain image - and a white person's image at that - of what they should be like. Rem acu tetigisti, Mr Malik! Essential reading, and an important voice for a third way in the race debate.

A third way *****

Malik begins with a discussion of race from a biological point of view. He clearly tends towards the fashionable viewpoint that race is not a valid biological concept, and seems to wish to perpetuate Lewontin's Fallacy. Although Malik demonstrates that there are indeed immense and apparently insurmountable difficulties in defining exactly what 'race' is, I don't feel that his argument that as a result the concept is invalid is conclusive. Just because we are unable to define such a concept rigorously doesn't mean that such categories can't exist at all, even in some fuzzy or naive sense. It feels a little like saying that life does not exist, because we haven't been able to agree upon a rigorous definition of what life is. Life clearly does exist, despite our failure to define it.

Malik progresses onto a discussion of European racism during the empire building and colonial period. One important part of his treatment which I think still has great relevance today, is how Europeans of the time had a tendency to treat black people who took part in the norms of European society as equals. Dress like us, speak like us, behave like us, we treat you exactly like one of us. What people call "racism" is actually more often "culturalism" as it were, and I think that this is very much the case in modern society.

Moving from the past to the present, Malik analyses the anti-racist movements of the modern day, and demonstrates how things have swung to the opposite pole entirely. Whereas 'racist' imperialist Europe allowed other races to become one of them by behaving like them, contemporary politically correct anti-racist movements do exactly the opposite. They do not even permit black people to behave like white people; on the contrary it is about white people telling black people how they must behave and actually confining them within a certain image - and a white person's image at that - of what they should be like. Rem acu tetigisti, Mr Malik!

Essential reading, and an important voice for a third way in the race debate.