In this lesson, students learn a brief history of the foundations of eugenics using excerpts from Erik Peterson’s The Shortest History of Eugenics. Peterson explains in his preface first that it is important to know the literal meaning of the word eugenics. “It’s a Greek word, and it just means ‘well born’ or ‘good birth.’”¹⁰ He goes on to say, “By the twentieth century, advocates symbolized eugenics as an all-encompassing pursuit for human improvement,” and within this, the concept of race was perceived as a biological determinant.¹⁰ Figures like Francis Galton and Charles Davenport promoted the idea that society could be improved by encouraging the reproduction of people with "desirable" traits and limiting those deemed "unfit." This idea of race, thanks to a slew of powerful figures popularizing the idea that categorizing people by physical traits-- such as skin color, skull shape, and facial features-- could be advantageous, then gained traction in the 18th and 19th centuries.¹⁰ We now know, however, that we cannot categorize humans in ways that mirror these taxonomies in biology, because modern genetics shows that human genetic variation does not align with the racial categories at all. Race is, in fact, a socially constructed idea, with no scientific basis whatsoever. It is a social theory developed in the context of slavery and colonialism and rooted in hierarchy and inequality. ”¹⁰
Knowing the origins of eugenics and understanding how it is rooted in pseudoscience does not mean the idea of race doesn’t have real consequences and implications for people in everyday life. Unfortunately, these false ideas are still infiltrating the minds of people all over the world. These ideas shape policies, perceptions, and hold great weight in how people see each other, as well as themselves. This takes us into how specifically these ideas have infiltrated Hispanic communities and have been used to justify horrible atrocities. For Hispanic people in the United States, particularly Mexican Americans, these ideologies were not abstract theories but daily realities that shaped their experiences in public health, immigration policy, and educational systems.
In this lesson, after defining eugenics, present students with Alexandra Minna Stern’s article Sterilized in the Name of Public Health, to explain how thousands of Mexican American women in California were involuntarily sterilized in the 20th century. Eugenicists described such women as “overly fertile” and described them as “unable to be good mothers.”¹¹ This eugenic ideal was used to justify government and health care officials taking away the ability of these women to have children. Doctors and health care providers said they were “protecting society” and “lowering welfare costs.”¹¹
