Pseudo-Science of Scientific Racism
Victorian Faith in Science
● Biblical ideas = unity
● Changes in Victorian Era
● Poverty seen as a moral failing
○ Biological
● Science becoming the basis of knowledge
○ Botanical gardens and zoos
○ Amateur collectors ; public debates
○ Science displays and experiments at the Mechanic’s Institute
○ Obsession with organizing everything into categories (starts to do this with
citizens and subjects)
Biological Facts and Social Outcomes
● Abandoned the one sex model
○ Argued that people have biological differences ; pours into race as well
○ Trying to categorize everything but not everything fits
● Phrenology, claimed that an individual’s personality and mental faculties could be
determined by studying the shape and contours of their skull
○ Debunked now but people were obsessed with it at the time
● In the colonies and at home
○ They think they can do this everywhere
● Remember the example of the Sarah Baartman on display as a scientific oddity
○ Before phrenology existed
○ Literally measure her ass
■ Displayed her as an “other
○ Almost 100 years later Josephine Baker
○ “Black sexual danger” on display for European titillation
○ Scantily clothed and highly sexualized dances with titles like “the savages’s
dance)
4/7/25
Homosexuality in Prewar Germany
● Gemeinschaft de Eigenen (Community of the Self Owned) founded in 1903
● Mannerbund ; community of men that praised the virile heroic soldier
○ Gains popularity after the war (WW1)
○ Encourage virile men who had experiences on the front lines to embrace it when
they returned home
● Berlin’s reputation as epicenter of gay life was used in British propaganda to connect
Germany to “sodomy and treachery” during the war
Victorian Faith in Science
● Biblical ideas = unity
● Changes in Victorian Era
● Poverty seen as a moral failing
○ Biological
● Science becoming the basis of knowledge
○ Botanical gardens and zoos
○ Amateur collectors ; public debates
○ Science displays and experiments at the Mechanic’s Institute
○ Obsession with organizing everything into categories (starts to do this with
citizens and subjects)
Biological Facts and Social Outcomes
● Abandoned the one sex model
○ Argued that people have biological differences ; pours into race as well
○ Trying to categorize everything but not everything fits
● Phrenology, claimed that an individual’s personality and mental faculties could be
determined by studying the shape and contours of their skull
○ Debunked now but people were obsessed with it at the time
● In the colonies and at home
○ They think they can do this everywhere
● Remember the example of the Sarah Baartman on display as a scientific oddity
○ Before phrenology existed
○ Literally measure her ass
■ Displayed her as an “other
○ Almost 100 years later Josephine Baker
○ “Black sexual danger” on display for European titillation
○ Scantily clothed and highly sexualized dances with titles like “the savages’s
dance)
4/7/25
Homosexuality in Prewar Germany
● Gemeinschaft de Eigenen (Community of the Self Owned) founded in 1903
● Mannerbund ; community of men that praised the virile heroic soldier
○ Gains popularity after the war (WW1)
○ Encourage virile men who had experiences on the front lines to embrace it when
they returned home
● Berlin’s reputation as epicenter of gay life was used in British propaganda to connect
Germany to “sodomy and treachery” during the war
