Race, Gender and IQ: the social consequence of a pseudo‐scientific discourse

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Abstract
Issues of differential intelligence among racial and gendered groups in society seem still to capture the popular imagination even now, 150 years since the rise of social Darwinism. Press reports of black people as less intelligent have been aroused recently in the UK by the publication of The Bell Curve in the USA. Similarly, reports that girls may be outperforming boys in examination results have invoked much media attention, reviving issues of differential genetic capacities between the sexes. This article aims to ask: Why does IQ, as an explanation for differential educational performance between the races and sexes, remain so popular? Despite its controversial empiricism, suspect methodology and inconclusive claims, the appeal of this pseudo‐scientific discourse remains intact. Its logical presentation of facts' and simple causal explanations heralds a ‘new post‐biological discourse’ on ‘difference’. At the end of the twentieth century ideas about innate, genetic, scientifically provable difference are still at the heart of our thinking about race and gender.

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