Daily we are asked—on the census, at the doctor’s office, by schools and employers and even social platforms—to mark our sex and race, with the tacit understanding that in doing so we are contributing, somehow, to the greater good. But as Angela Saini shows in this gripping reassessment of data and identity, we are sleepwalking into a minefield.

Other takes us from the idealistic 1960s, when categories used to divide people were repurposed to administer equal rights, to today, when they have been twisted back to their original purpose. Governments from the United States to Hungary have narrowed their definitions of ‘man’ and ‘woman’ to curb reproductive freedoms; rogue researchers are mining medical data in the hunt for spurious links between race and intelligence; and lawmakers are using census maps intended to protect civil rights for racial gerrymandering. Latin American countries that once abandoned race categories on their censuses are bringing them back and in 2027, the Indian census will classify people by caste for the first time since 1931. The rise of artificial intelligence is supercharging it all, with China using ethnicity ‘recognition’ technologies to track minorities and opaque private firms like Palantir entrusted with government data to manage migration and health.

Unaware of the risks, we continue to run headlong for categories that serve those at the top far better than those at the bottom. Making an original, provocative case for leaning away from categorization, Saini urges us to consider what we lose when we are placed in a box. As classification draws us further into its grip, the only escape route is the final category on any form, the one that defies definition: “Other”.

Praise for Angela Saini:

“An amazing science writer. She has an ability to distill big, complicated topics into something digestible and clear without dumbing it down.”—Daniel Radcliffe, in Vulture

“One of the world’s best science writers.”—Ed Yong, Pulitzer Prize-winning author of An Immense World

Praise for The Patriarchs:

“This is an impressive, breathtaking and thought-provoking book which unwraps the concept and history of patriarchy with clear intellectual precision.”—Financial Times

“A new Angela Saini book is always an event for me, and The Patriarchs didn’t disappoint.”—New Statesman

“Angela Saini begins her stirring interrogation of patriarchy by arguing that it is neither constant, inevitable nor unshakeable . . . By the end of this fascinating and insightful book, Saini is optimistic: big shifts in the status of women have occurred in the past, and will in the future.”—The Guardian

Praise for Superior:

“To skew research in ways that support one’s own world views is to abdicate the methods and tools of science, developed precisely to ferret out such bias wherever and whenever it appears. The social, cultural, and anthropological ranking of humans is especially susceptible to pernicious racism, as Saini explores in this timely and illuminating treatise.”—Neil deGrasse Tyson

“Magisterial, forensic.”—The Telegraph

“A landmark work that will forever change how we think about race. An unputdownable book and a staggering accomplishment.”—Sonia Faleiro, author of Beautiful Thing