Frank Dikötter. The Discourse of Race in Modern China. Stanford,
Calif.: Stanford University Press, 1992. $57.95 (cloth), ISBN
978-0-8047-1994-0. Reviewed by Ralph A. Litzinger (Duke
University) Published on H-World (August, 1995) This book is an
important contribution to an ongoing discussion among scholars
interested in identity politics in late nineteenth- and early-
twentieth-century China. It has already resulted in the
formation of research conferences, workshops, and panel
presentations in the United States, Hong Kong, Australia, Taiwan
and the People's Republic of China on the problem of race and
culture in modern China. I welcome this book for its courageous
exploration of a topic that many scholars have chosen to ignore
(for reasons that Dikotter should have addressed in much further
detail). I applaud its attempt to bring a critical theoretical
perspective to bear on complex historical material. Dikotter
delves into the problematic of perception, as he attempts to
link ideas of racial difference to