Historical Studies (Chinese Edition)

No.6, 2013

 

Buffon's American Degeneracy and Its Influence

(Abstract)

 

Wang Xiaode

 

American Degeneracy is a complete set of views on the New World expounded by Georges-Louis Leclerc, Comte de Buffon, a French naturalist of the European Age of Enlightenment. It was intended as a complete rejection of the New World arrived at through a comparison with European civilization. Buffon’s theory painted the superiority of European civilization in vivid colors, and claimed the mantle of "science" for its conclusions. In fact, the work lacked any meticulous basis of scientific research, but it was influential in shaping European thinking on America in an era when the superiority of European civilization was the dominant view. Errors in its premises ended up driving these highly prejudiced theories from the stage of history, but the image of the American "Other" that it established has deep roots in the minds of many European elites. In this sense, Buffon's American Degeneracy both sowed the seeds of cultural anti-Americanism in Europe and raised the curtain for it.