Abstract

This article analyzes the development of race alongside Machiavelli’s writing on difference and his theorization of the relationship between truth and appearances. I focus on the rise of blood purity statutes in early modern Spain, showing how racialization responded to anxieties regarding the ability to discern subjects’ true identity. Whereas race functioned to cover over the potential gap between truth and appearances, I argue that Machiavelli insisted upon the impossibility of bridging this gap. He thus offers us a theory of subjecthood that resists racialization.

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