British Raj
In India, the British colonial government had followed de Gobineau's
arguments along another line, and had fostered the idea of a superior
"Aryan race" that co-opted the Indian caste system in favor of imperial
interests.[112][113] In its fully developed form, the British-mediated
interpretation foresaw a segregation of Aryan and non-Aryan along the
lines of caste, with the upper castes being "Aryan" and the lower ones
being "non-Aryan". The European developments not only allowed the
British to identify themselves as high-caste, but also allowed the
Brahmins to view themselves as on-par with the British. Further, it
provoked the reinterpretation of Indian history in racialist and, in
opposition, Indian Nationalist terms.[112][113]
Nazism and white supremacy
An intertitle from the silent
film blockbuster The Birth of a Nation (1915). "Aryan birthright" is here
"white birthright", the "defense" of which unites "whites" in the
Northern and Southern U.S. against "coloreds". In another film of the
same year, The Aryan , William S. Hart's "Aryan" identity is defined in
distinction from other peoples.
Through the works of Houston Stewart Chamberlain, Gobineau's ideas
influenced the Nazi racial ideology, which saw the "Aryan race" as
innately superior to other putative racial groups.[12] The Nazi