Measuring the Master Race: Physical Anthropology in Norway 1890-1945 - cover image

Copyright

Jon Røyne Kyllingstad

Published On

2014-12-22

ISBN

Paperback978-1-909254-54-1
Hardback978-1-909254-55-8
PDF978-1-909254-56-5
HTML978-1-80064-478-6
EPUB978-1-909254-57-2
MOBI978-1-909254-58-9

Language

  • English

Print Length

276 pages (xxii + 254)

Dimensions

Paperback156 x 15 x 234 mm(6.14" x 0.58" x 9.21")
Hardback156 x 17 x 234 mm(6.14" x 0.69" x 9.21")

Weight

Paperback864g (30.48oz)
Hardback1247g (43.99oz)

Media

Illustrations27

OCLC Number

900407883

LCCN

2019452829

BIC

  • JHMP
  • 1DN
  • JPFQ

BISAC

  • SOC002020
  • HIS044000
  • SOC031000

LCC

  • GN50.45.N6

Keywords

  • Race
  • ideology
  • Nazism
  • Norwegian physical anthropology
  • Scandinavia
  • nationalism
  • national identity

Measuring the Master Race

Physical Anthropology in Norway 1890-1945

  • Jon Røyne Kyllingstad (author)
The notion of a superior ‘Germanic’ or ‘Nordic’ race was a central theme in the ideology of the Nazis. But it was also a commonly accepted idea in the early twentieth century, and an actual scientific concept originating from anthropological research on the physical characteristics of Europeans. The Scandinavian Peninsula was considered to be the historical cradle and the core area of this ‘master race’.

This book investigates the role played by Scandinavian scholars in inventing this so-called superior race, and discusses how this concept put its stamp on Norwegian physical anthropology, prehistory, national identity, and on the Norwegian eugenics movement. It also explores the decline and scientific disputation of these ideas in the 1930s as they came to be associated with the ‘genetic cleansing’ of Nazi Germany.

This is the first comprehensive study on Norwegian physical anthropology, and its findings shed new light on current political and scientific debates about race across the globe.

Reviews

Measuring the Master Race by Kyllingstad,which explores the various theories and debates held by Norwegian anthropologists and eugenicists on the concept of a superior Nordic race in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, is an important contribution to [Physical anthropology's history] research . . . Measuring the Master Race, the first monograph to open up Norwegian anthropology to the English-reading audience, will be of interest to anyone working on the history of anthropology and racial science.

Iris Clever

"Kyllingstad, Jon Røyne. Measuring the master race: physical anthropology in Norway, 1890-1945". Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute (1359-0987), vol. 24, no. 1, 2018. doi:10.1111/1467-9655.12779

Full Review

Contents

1. The Origin of the Long-skulled Germanic Race

(pp. 1–16)
  • Jon Røyne Kyllingstad

2. The Germanic Race and Norwegian Nationalism

(pp. 17–34)
  • Jon Røyne Kyllingstad

3. The Germanic Race and Norwegian Anthropology, 1880-1910

(pp. 35–64)
  • Jon Røyne Kyllingstad

4. Norwegian Nationhood and the Germanic Race, 1890-1910

(pp. 65–86)
  • Jon Røyne Kyllingstad

5. Racial Hygiene and the Nordic Race, 1900-1933

(pp. 87–114)
  • Jon Røyne Kyllingstad

6. Halfdan Bryn and the Nordic Race

(pp. 115–132)
  • Jon Røyne Kyllingstad

7. The Schreiners and the Science of Race

(pp. 133–158)
  • Jon Røyne Kyllingstad

8. From Collaboration to Conflict: The Racial Survey of 1923-1929

(pp. 159–190)
  • Jon Røyne Kyllingstad

9. Science and Ideology, 1925–1945

(pp. 191–218)
  • Jon Røyne Kyllingstad

10. The Fall of Nordic Master Race

(pp. 219–232)
  • Jon Røyne Kyllingstad

Introduction

(pp. xiii–xxii)
  • Jon Røyne Kyllingstad

Contributors

Jon Røyne Kyllingstad

(author)
Senior Curator at Norsk Teknisk Museum