Race the
Illusion
Ethnicity
the Reality
RACE:
A DEFINITION?
Trusty Home Dictionary
1) a family, tribe, or people of the
same stock (a group having a
common origin)
2) a group of individuals within a
species able to breed together
Souped-up Classroom Dictionary
1) a group of individuals sharing a
common bloodline or descent
Given these definitions, how many
races exist?
TAXONOMY
Taxonomy is the science of describing, identifying, naming and classifying organisms into ordered categories.
Linnaean Taxonomy
Human Taxonomy (actual)
Racial Taxonomy (imagined)
Animalia
KINGDOM
Chordata
PHYLUM
Mammalia
CLASS
Primate
ORDER
Hominidae
FAMILY
Homo
GENUS
Sapiens
SPECIES
Please note: RACE does not appear in actual human
taxonomy and is not an actual taxonomic classification
Race science claims either that humans evolved or were
created as separate species called races OR that the
Human species evolved over time into separate a number
of distinct sub-species called races.
RACE A
RACE B
RACE C
RACE D
RACE A
RACE B
RACE C
RACE D
Both claims are
false
ORIGINS OF
RACE SCIENCE
In the 1700 and 1800s, Europeans developed a triangular slave
trade. They shipped goods to Africa to buy slaves, they shipped
slaves from Africa to the Americas for sale, and they shipped
sugar and molasses back to Europe.
American colonists and then American citizens bought slaves to
use as a cheap, permanent and renewable labor source
(European indentured servants were refusing to work after
Bacons rebellion).
Both slave traders and slave owners, however, were Christian,
and Christianity has theological problems with human
trafficking.
“Jesus replied, ‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and
with all your soul and with all your mind.’ This is the first and
greatest commandment. And the second is like it: ‘Love your
neighbor as yourself.’ All the Law and the Prophets hang on
these two commandments.” (Matt. 22:36-40)
Therefore, neither the slave trade nor slave ownership are
permissible if slaves are humans.
However, if slaves were not actually human but instead were
animals, then their sale and their use on plantations would be
no different than any other livestock.
ORIGINS OF
RACE SCIENCE
European and American scientists then began asking why (not if) slaves were different
from normal humans.
One answer was that they looked drastically different.
The colonists, all from a geographically small and select area (remember, 90% of
migrants to America before 1840 came from a single place: Great Britain), had relatively
similar physical attributes.
The slaves, again all from a geographically small and select area (western, central Africa)
had relatively similar physical attributes.
And Colonists and slaves could be told apart simply by looking at them.
These scientists then went about carefully studying and measuring all physical attributes
of various European, African, Native Americans and Asia ethnicities. These scientists
would later be called Eugenicists.
They took their data and then created norms or types for each ethnic group.
They also theorized that there was not a single human family.
Instead, there were multiple, separate and distinct types of humans out there, and they
called those types “races” (from razza meaning breed or lineage).
DEVELOPMENT
OF RACISM
Those who developed and those who accepted the theory of race were called Racists.
Racism operates on three levels or three steps.
Racism Level 1
Racism Level 2
Racism Level 3
(racial classification)
(racial determinism)
(racial hierarchy)
Asserts that the human family is divided
into separate and distinct races.
These races are made distinct by shared
physical characteristics such as skin, hair
and eye color, texture and form as well as
bone structure.
The original structure asserted four races,
each tied to a broad, geographic region in
which each race was said to have been
created or to have evolved due to time
and isolation.
Caucasoid: Europe-West Asia-North Africa
Mongoloid: East Asia-Arctic-Americas
Australoid: Australia-Melanesia
Negroid: Sub-Saharan Africa
Others asserted numbers of races up to
over on hundred.
Asserts that race carries with it other,
more complex traits automatically. Race
determines:
Asserts that, due to their inherent
characteristics, races can be ranked and
classified as from inferior to superior.
--cultural traits: food, music, clothing and
shelter styles, etc.
--intellectual traits: academic skills and
abilities, memory, reason, etc.
--behavioral traits: physical aptitude and
abilities, general health traits, etc.
--moral traits and values: level of
promiscuity, honesty, integrity, etc.
--Caucasoids were the most developed
race and were fully human.
--Other races were not as developed and
therefore not fully human.
--Negroids were placed as the least
developed and therefore most like
animals.
--Mongoloids and Australoids in between.
If you know a person’s race, you know
who, what and how they will be.
Each race has a certain place in society
and is made for certain work and
treatment in accordance with its nature.
Race scientists (racists) ascribed various
inherent expressions to each race, usually
those that excelled to caucasoids and
lesser degrees to other races.
CONSEQUENCES
OF RACE SCIENCE
Race science allowed Europeans and Americans (as well as others
worldwide) to pursue the slave trade with a clear conscience.
To Caucasoids (Europeans, colonists and their descendents) were
ascribed advanced and noble characteristics, especially those of
intellect and morality. The Caucasoid was fit to be the ruler of
society.
To Negroids (sub-saharan Africans, slaves and their descendents)
were ascribed inferior and animal characteristics, especially those of
brute strength and hyper-sexuality. The Negroid was fit to be the
beast of burden for society.
Violence against negroids was also not problematic as one could not
really commit a crime against a thing that was not human but was
instead animal, and therefore property.
Europeans and American adopted race science whole-heartedly and
taught it as a system in schools. They also exercised it against other
groups they classified as lower races (American Indians, east Asians,
etc.)
Later, Hitler would adopt European racial science and use it to
reclassify Jews as a race rather than a religious or ethnic group.
This system of thinking carried on well into the 1900s and is still
largely pervasive (at varying degrees) today, especially to the extent
that an area is inhabited or was colonized by Europeans and
Americans.
CONSEQUENCES
OF RACE
SCIENCE
SEGREGATION
In 1865, following the US Civil War, the 13th amendment officially abolished slavery in the United States. It DID NOT, however, abolish race.
The 14th amendment (1868) guaranteed equal protection under the law. It DID NOT abolish race.
The 15th amendment (1870) allowed former slaves to vote. It DID NOT abolish race.
Therefore, even though slaves were now free, they were still “black” (in the US, the Negroid race had come to be known simply by its color, as
had caucasoids– whites). As blacks, they were still subject to all the innate, inferior traits of their race.
The white majority in the US saw other races as OTHER, as different and therefore as separate. Nationwide, de facto systems of segregation
(the forced [often by law] separation of races in all aspects of daily life).
In 1896, the US Supreme Court issued the “Separate but Equal Doctrine” in its decision in the case of Plessy v. Ferguson. This decision legalized
segregation as long as all races had “equal” access to separate goods and services.
In the South, segregation laws were called “Jim Crow” laws. Northern cities were often just as segregated, but in de facto rather than legal ways.
In the European colony of South Africa, this same system was called Apartheid.
CONSEQUENCES
OF RACE
SCIENCE
WHITE FLIGHT
BLOCKBUSTING
REDLINING
In 1954, the US Supreme Court’s Brown v. Board of Education
decision officially made segregation unconstitutional.
It DID NOT abolish race. Therefore, while it mandated that blacks be
fully integrated into white society and have access to the SAME
goods and services, blacks were still subject to the same “natural
laws” of race that made them inferior as a race.
As blacks gained access to formerly all-white neighborhoods and
public schools, white populations migrated almost en-masse to
suburbs surrounding urban areas and began establishing private
schools. This was called white flight.
They established extremely high property values in these suburbs as
well as high tuition costs which created a de facto segregation for
lower income black families.
In a practice called blockbusting, unscrupulous real estate agents
would play on racial fears in all-white neighborhoods, convince
homeowners to sell their homes at deflated prices, and then resell
the same homes at inflated prices to black families.
All of these practices are rooted in race science- the
teaching about separate races and their supposedly
innate characteristics and ranking.
In a practice called red-lining, banks would take a map and draw red
likes around certain minority race neighborhoods and would not
grant loans to people in those neighborhoods.
COMPETING
THEORIES ON
HUMAN DIFFERENCE
In modern society, there competing theories on human difference.
The theory of race, although still deeply entrenched in society, has been almost entirely rejected by the scientific community.
PHYSICAL ANTHROPOLOGY
Most physical anthropologists reject the
third and second levels of racism as well
as the first level– the concept of races in
general.
Instead, these anthropologists associate
certain physical characteristics as
dominant or common in geographic
regions and people who lived there or
have descendents from them recently.
A small number of physical
anthropologists still adhere to the claims
of race science
BIOLOGICAL ANTHROPOLOGY
CULTURAL ANTHROPOLOGY
Flatly rejects the theory of race as
scientifically baseless and rooted in power.
Flatly rejects the theory of race as
scientifically baseless/rooted in power.
Instead groups humans in terms of similarity
through meaningful and real biological
characteristics:
Instead groups humans in terms of
similarity through shared cultural traits
(artifacts, mentifacts and sociofacts).
Blood type
Metabolic types
Genetic traits
Various cultural groups are called
ethnicities, where an ethnic group is a
group of people who share a common
culture by being born where that culture
is practiced (geographically).
When grouped in this way, members of each
so called race are represented in each
biological category.
Indeed, most genetic diversity falls within, not
between, so-called race groups.
These traits are social, not genetic and
are therefore not “real” like biology, but
they are more meaningful to humans
than blood type and create real human
bonds.
These groups recognize the non-existence of race as a
scientific/natural fact. (It IS NOT a Taxonomic Category) They
do recognize its enduring power as a historical/social practice.
REJECTING
RACE
As a theory, race proves false for a number of
reasons. Mainly because of the way race
addresses “difference” between humans.
The majority of physical anthropologists (and
all Biological and Cultural) recognize all
modern humans as members of a single,
unified species (homo sapiens) who are
physically identical with only minor, surface
variations in traits.
At one point, there were other species of
humans (like the Neanderthal), but those
other human species went extinct long ago.
As for homo sapiens, it has not had sufficient
time (its only about 200,000 years old) or
isolation (human populations have always
migrated and mated) to evolve into separate
sub-species.
QUALIFYING
DIFFERENCE
REJECTING
RACE
Race theory also fails because of the way it manufactures differences between racial groups.
For a difference to be real, it must be based on objective, clear, meaningful and distinct qualities.
OBJECTIVE
CLEAR
MEANINGFUL
DISTINCT
The physical qualities that
distinguish race categories
are not objective.
The physical qualities that
distinguish race categories
are not clear.
The physical qualities that
distinguish race categories
are not meaningful.
The physical qualities that
distinguish race are not
actually distinct.
Physical qualities like the
color, shape or texture of
skin, hair and eyes and the
shape of bones are objective
There is no clear, consistent,
universal set of qualities for
race judgment.
First, external physical traits
do not code genetically for
any other trait nor for any
behavior or ability.
There is no single trait that
all members of a given race
share.
However, these qualities and
their variations operate on
continuous spectra like light
to dark for skin or straight to
curly for hair form.
Therefore, the decision of
where dark skin colors stop
and light ones start is
entirely subjective and
personal.
The set of qualities shifts
with the only objective as
making the other not white.
For example, the
differentiation between
blacks and whites is usually
made on skin color.
However, the difference
between Asians and whites
(same skin color) becomes
eye shape.
Second, all “races” can
interact fully, biologically.
For example, there is no
such thing as “white blood”
or an “asian liver.”
However, if a person with Ablood got a transfusion of B+
blood, she would die. That
is a meaningful difference.
Race is not real in the way sex (male/female) is. It is a social construct
created for the sole purpose of rationalizing class differences.
There is no single quality
that ONLY members of a
certain race can have.
Members of evry race can
breed, give blood and
donate organs and tissues to
all other races.
A venn diagram of races by
characteristic would show
more overlap than isolation.
According to the US census bureau, race categories are
self-identified. You are the race you most identify with.
THE GEOGRAPHIC
PERSPECTIVE
Human Geographers also reject race’s existence and its use in classifying humans.
In fact, Human Geography does not pay attention to the way people look at all.
It does focus on ethnicity- the cultural inheritance of a person based on the customs of his
geographic origin. This chapter will study ethnicity.
It also focuses on how ethnicity is distributed across space as well as how ethnic groups migrate
and disperse or stay clustered and how, why and where they clash with other ethnicities.
When human geographers classify and group people, they do so by geographic origin and/or
ethnicity (religious, linguistic, material expressions, etc.)
For example:
African-American is an ethnic term referring to a person who’s family descended from African
immigrants (not to physical appearance).
Asian-American is an ethnic term referring to a person who’s family descended from Asian
immigrants (not to physical appearance).
Hispanic is an ethnic term referring to a person who’s family descended from Spanish
immigrants (not to physical appearance).
Chinese is an ethnic term referring to a person who’s family descended from Chinese nationals
(not to physical appearance).
You get the idea. Now on to ethnicity.