GÖNCÜOĞLU, M. Önder Ege University - English Language and Literature, Turkey

From Classificatory Theories to Social Darwinism and Western Manipulation in the World

22377

In order to understand how the expansion of an empire means more than geographical expansion, the whole process of both the eighteenth century classificatory system and nineteenth century Social Darwinism should be taken into account. We must therefore consider how the European viewed the non-European as the wild and ‘the other’; how they legitimised the idea of the white man’s superiority over ‘the other’. Only then can some certain texts written under the influence of such thinking be perceived in a wider scope with certain causes and results as well. Such thinking regarding ‘the other’ related both to the scientific classification system of the eighteenth century and to Social Darwinism as the prevailing ideology of the late nineteenth century milieu. Therefore, the primary goal of this article is to clarify how such western thinking was first moulded and then galvanized through scientific proofs to make the idea of the inferiority of the non-European “other” common among Europeans.

97

Classification , Social , Darwinism , empire , ‘the other’

Mediterranean Journal Of Humanities

106