Carolyn Rouse, the Ritter Professor of Anthropology, will present “Necropolitics at the End of Empire: The Paradox of White Supremacy in the U.S.” for our third talk in the fall 2021 HMEI Faculty Seminar Series.

Rouse will explore how declining life expectancies among white Americans has led to a paradox of white supremacy where the state enables self-destructive politics based on fantasies of race and freedom. While presumed that white racism is directed solely at Black and brown people, Rouse’s fieldwork among rural low-income white Americans has found a deeply held Malthusian eugenics that advocates — at times under the guise of environmentalism — for the annihilation of various segments of the population.

The net effect is that the solution to people’s economic, social and personal problems has become the dismantling of the biopolitical state structured to protect and care for white Americans in the first place.

Register here to attend this talk in person (PUID holders only) or via Zoom livestream.

In-person attendance is currently available for registered Princeton University ID holders only and face coverings are required. In-person attendance is contingent on University guidelines for indoor events — updates will be posted as necessary. The livestream is open to the public and the University community.