Charles W. Mills (Contemporary) But What Are You Really? The Metaphysics of Race
In his essay, Mills explores the metaphysical dimension of racial identity among different groups and how that may contribute to forms of racial privilege. Racial identity is categorized under certain criteria, being bodily appearance, ancestry, self-awareness of ancestry, public awareness of ancestry, culture, experiences, and self-identification. Mills considers the ontological implications of those who possess the racial identity commonly assumed to be the “other.” He calls this sociological experience, racial constructivism, in which binding social implications arise from race. Race, therefore, does not possess reality in a realist sense, but it certainly possesses a reality in an objectivist sense. It is not metaphysical “in the deep sense of being eternal, unchanging, necessary, part of the basic furniture of the universe.” It has a different sort of reality which has historically interfered with social structures on an ontological level, thereby being integral to a group or individual’s identity.
Thought Experiments: Quace and Racial transgressions.
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