Reflections on the Racial Scepticism View of Appiah

In the words of Appiah about race he argues and say that race does not exist it is something that is social constructed and that talking about it is meaningless (Appiah 1996). In this essay I will talk about how Appiah’s approach on race and Identity should be taken into serious consideration as race is not defined the same way all over the world. Which means definitely race is something that is socially constructed in order to categorise people and put them to groups of a different skin colour.

I say whether you define race by the colour of the skin of both parents or by genes it very much difficult to come to the same conclusion of actually of what race is. Appiah argues that genes and biological traits of a person only shows how unique an individual is as people from the same family can have different biological traits and behave differently so we can not say that race is inherent. If race was inherent people of the same family would be expected to have same skin colour and hair type and the same cognitive approach when doing things. So basically race is constructed differently in every region of the world we cannot limit all the aspect that makes us human beings ourselves into one narrow idea which is “race”. All individuals are different in their own whether they have the same skin colour or not they do not think nor act the same way whether they come from the same family or not. So in Appiah’s perspective the term race is nothing more than a box to put people on and make them to be objected under race.

One might argues that race should not be entirely as Appiah says it does not exist so there is no need for race for a lot of people identify themselves through racial groups. Some people see racial groups as a place of belonging so by saying that race does not exist and we must do away from it, it is like you are telling them to forsake a part of their lives which makes them who they are. Someone might view Appiah’s approach to race as a concept that denies individual differences hence some people believe in identifying themselves in their physical appearances which why they believe that different skin colour and hair means different race. Some people have beliefs and values that they were taught by belonging in different race group so by saying race does not exist your are saying that everything that they have learned through out their lives through belonging in a race group was all for nothing. Some people pretty much have the mentality that belonging to a racial group makes you superior than people belonging to another racial group because there are misconceptions that some race are better than the other biologically.

But also the idea of saying race does not exist and we must part away with it does not mean that people must forsake themselves or their identity simple because race is not the way only way people can identify themselves. Before we have group identity we first have individual identity since we are all different in our own way so for a person to only identify you with only the colour of your skin they are making you an object that they can put a label on. So actually really is not what people claim to be Appiah has to approach when defining race which are Ideational view of meaning and referential view of meaning. In the ideational meaning view it is sad that we learn to construct race and it is not something that we are born into but it something that is taught to us by society. The referential view it relies solely on history and how race it was first defined and expected to performed by people of a different geographical area or people of different skin colour again which goes to show that there is not one exact way define race and our different as human beings so people should not be reduced to mire objects by labelling them through race because race is not real and talking about is meaningless it produce no productivity but division.

Appiah was trying to promote unity when he said race does not exist and we should completely forget about it. People are divided because they are judging each other based on their skin whereas having different pigmentation than the other person does not make them a lesser person than you. And yes no amount of skin colour or genes can fully define the term race and distinguish people race just by looking their physical appearance or looking the outside appearance can bring light to what exactly race is. That is the very reason Appiah says there is no race but differences between people and those difference comes from the cognitive psyche of a person not from skin colour or genes.