Anténor Firmin

Dzieła

• 1885O równości ras ludzkich (Antropologia pozytywna)

  Odpowiedź Gobineau, która bada ówczesną antropologię – pomiary czaszek, klasyfikacje, historię Egiptu i Haiti – i dochodzi do wniosku, że wszystkie rasy ludzkie są równe pod względem zdolności.

Stanowisko

Firmin turned the methods of the anthropology of his time against its racist conclusions. “The Equality of the Human Races”, subtitled “Positive Anthropology”, follows Comte’s idea of a positive science but asks for evidence where his colleagues relied on prejudice: skull measurements and classifications by skin colour do not show stable differences of ability; the civilisation of ancient Egypt was African; and the history of Haiti, from the revolution of 1791–1804 onwards, refutes the claim that Black people are incapable of self-government. He argued that all human races are equal in capacity and that differences arise from history and circumstances. The book received little response in France and was long forgotten; its English translation (2000) with an introduction by Carolyn Fluehr-Lobban made it known as an early classic of critical anthropology, and it is now discussed in histories of Africana and Caribbean thought, for example by Lewis R. Gordon (2008).

Życie i kontekst

Joseph Anténor Firmin was born on 18 October 1850 in Cap-Haïtien in northern Haiti into a family of modest means. He worked as a teacher, journalist and lawyer. In 1883 he went to Paris as a diplomat; in 1884 he was admitted to the Société d’anthropologie de Paris, whose members included leading advocates of racial classification. In 1885 he published “The Equality of the Human Races” there, a reply to Gobineau and to the anthropology of his colleagues. Back in Haiti he was minister of finance and foreign affairs from 1889 to 1891 and resisted the United States’ demand for a naval base at Môle Saint-Nicolas in negotiations in which Frederick Douglass took part as US minister. Later he represented Haiti in Paris. In 1902 he stood for the presidency; after his defeat in a civil war he went into exile on the Danish island of Saint Thomas, from where he wrote “Mr Roosevelt, President of the United States, and the Republic of Haiti” (1905) and the “Letters from Saint Thomas” (1910). He died on Saint Thomas on 19 September 1911.

Dalsze główne dzieła

• The Equality of the Human Races (De l’égalité des races humaines. Anthropologie positive, 1885)
• Mr Roosevelt, President of the United States, and the Republic of Haiti (M. Roosevelt, président des États-Unis, et la République d’Haïti, 1905)
• Letters from Saint Thomas (Lettres de Saint-Thomas, 1910)