What Is Race? Four Philosophers, Six Views

Abstract

I. The Structure of the Book What is Race? is one of the latest notable instalments in the metaphysics of race debate. In the first half of the book, each author presents their respective answers to the question ‘What is race?’. The second half of the book comprises of each author responding to their co-authors and defending their own views. This format is highly engaging. Seeing each author make their arguments, respond to their co-authors, and try meet the challenges set by their co-authors against their respective positions makes this work a great pedagogical tool and an exemplar of contemporary philosophical argumentation in the analytic tradition. The authors draw out the presuppositions that frame the race debate in ways that make apparent general semantic issues of reference and the challenges about which interpretive traditions contemporary accounts of race should follow. Despite these challenges, the text is not bogged down in a tangle of semantic disputes but rather tackles the metaphysical question of race using a range of argumentative strategies.