The racism of Maria Montessori

Abstract

ABSTRACT In this historical study, the author explores the racial views of Maria Montessori as expressed in her largely forgotten 1913 book, Pedagogical Anthropology. As a physician and physical anthropologist, Montessori espoused three racial beliefs that were in wide circulation during the late nineteenth century: biological racism, racial determinism, and craniology. Montessori combined these beliefs to warrant the underlying conviction that the races of the world were organized hierarchically with the White races at the top and the races of colour at the bottom, and that, even within the broader White race, there were numerous racial types that could likewise be organized hierarchically based on their physiological features and intellectual potential. The author demonstrates how Montessori expressed these racist beliefs in Pedagogical Anthropology, how she connected them to her famous pedagogy and curriculum, and how they fit into the racial discourses of contemporaneous educators and anthropologists.