“One of the Most Uniform Races of the Entire World”: Creole Eugenics and the Myth of Chilean Racial Homogeneity

Abstract

This article illuminates why Nicolás Palacios’s 1904 monograph, Raza chilena: Libro escrito por un Chileno i para los Chilenos [Chilean Race: A Book Written by a Chilean for Chileans], is central to the creation of a myth of Chilean racial homogeneity at the turn of the twentieth century. Placing Palacios in the context of Latin American eugenic discourse, it demonstrates how he selected a specific racial origin story in order to accommodate his belief in racial hierarchy while also depicting race mixing in a positive light. Specifically, the article highlights how the myth of Chilean racial homogeneity elided the difference between the term “mestizo,” which was applied to people of mixed racial heritage, and “white.” I contend that Palacios sought to differentiate Chileans from other Latin Americans by emphasizing their racial distinctiveness. The article therefore highlights that Latin American eugenics was concerned with the creation of national narratives that historicized particular racial mixtures in order to reify and affirm national differences. As such, it connects to literature regarding the history of eugenics, race, nation, and the creation of whiteness.