zsana
Moderator
Joined: 05 Feb 2005
{Posts: 1031 }
|
 Posted: Fri 28 Apr 2006 18:25 Post subject: Race Matters (And Does Not Matter) |
 |
|
Came across an interesting and entertaining article so I of course had to share. I think it's wonderful how more and more white people in the public eye are publicly acknowledging distant African ancestry. It shows (to me at least) that the ODR is indeed weakening, if growing numbers of white Americans can admit to having "black blood" running through their veins (just like they have historically and currently done concerning Native-American heritage) and still be considered white.
This is progress.
And it shows that One Droppers are being less than honest when they claim (those that do claim this) the world will automatically consider you a fill in the blank if you disclose black roots or it's discovered. This is one of the fear tactics some use against non hispanic biracial people - even those with completely Caucasian phenotypes - who dare proclaim a biracial or heaven forbide white identity over a black one.
If there were truly a negative life changing consequence currently to disclosing Sub-Saharan African ancestry, why would an intelligent, successful, and likable white person like Ms. Voss (I'm obviously excluding white racists - and those who have racist family members/spouses - who surely would have something to hide and be fearful about upon discovery of distant black ancestry) do it? Why would she risk harm to her career, relationships, and family name in the community to disclose this new information?
I think she must feel (correctly) that times have indeed changed (thank God and it's about time) and in normal non Aryan Nation/KKK/NOI etc... society there is no risk or harm. All of America is NOT racist and rabidly searching for every "last drop". But you'de swear by listening to some, that you were living in an alternate universe. One where the race police are everywhere, constantly on the lookout for "infultrators" and "imposters".
Enough from me and my rambling. Enjoy the article!
Race Matters (And Does Not Matter)
Katrina Voss
http://www.katrinavossonline.com/default.php
Tuesday, April 04, 2006[/b]
| Quote: | In the 1995 film, White Man's Burden, John Travolta and Harry Belafonte play, respectively, a white and black man in a doppelganger upside-down world in which black people are the social elite. There is even a "Guess Who's Coming to Dinner" moment in which a teenage black daughter brings home a -gasp!- white boy to introduce to her parents.
The film's intention was not to spread some saccharine message about walking in someone else's shoes. Instead, it was a clever strategy that highlighted race in order to show, ironically, that race matters not at all... while class, economics, education, and perhaps more importantly, perception, are the elements that divide people.
Social constructions aside, classification has its convenience, and simplification its purpose. No one understands this more than scientists. This goes in this category; that goes in that. The DNA analysis to determine ancestry I mentioned last week provides for four such neat categories: Indo-European, Sub-Saharan African, East Asian, and Native American. The clines I also mentioned- darker at the equator, larger at the poles, etc.- also make a certain intuitive sense when seen through the prismatic lens of evolutionary development.
Of course, on our well-traveled and amalgamated Earth, the lines are quite blurred in individuals, and the connection of race to climatic zones in the modern world is, perhaps, almost thoroughly undone. For that matter, genes that can be ethnically separated code for more than what we notice and associate with "race" (eye color, skin color, hair color and texture, feature shapes, etc.) while there may be visible, but generally unnoticed physical characteristics that appear frequently within certain groups of people. (For example, longitudinal femur growth seems to vary among racial groups.) Further, "race" can be linked to other, non-visible factors (such as propensity to certain ailments, metabolism of certain nutrients, etc.)
And now to the results. My own profile shows that I am 2% Sub-Saharan African and 98% European. That is, statistically, of 100 of my ancestors, two were black.
Now take my friend Peggy, a tall, pouty-lipped Chinese girl with long coltish legs. Like me, she has very little variety melted into her ancestral pot, with 98% East Asian and 2% Sub-Saharan African.
Others, however, find their pots melteth and runneth over. Take PhD student Marc, a dirty-blond, smoldering Frenchman, complete with silkily-pronounced consonants and a permanent expression of smug boredom. Almost 15% of his ancestry is Native American. (I should explain that "Native American" refers, and somewhat deceptively, to those peoples who likely originated in central Asia, some of whom crossed the Bering Strait into the Americas, others of whom traveled westward into Eastern Europe.) At any rate, Marc, at least genetically, is less European than I. According to our genetic profiles, it is I who should be sitting on a terrasse nibbling a sandwich au jambon, looking down my straight white nose at tourists.
Now take Trish, with her light brown eyes, blond hair, and a melanin index reading at the low end of the spectrum (she is milky pale and burns easily). Test results show that Trish is 9% Sub-Saharan African and 91% European. Genotypically, Trish is more African than I, even though I have very dark brown, very curly hair, dark, almost pupiless eyes, a higher melanin content, and I rarely burn.
According to the collective and more extensive results of the study, 30% of self-identified "white" Americans have, like Trish and myself, some Sub-Saharan African blood, whether or not they appear "black" on some small scale phenotypically. Considering the history of transatlantic slave trade to British North America, this mixture is hardly surprising. In his book, Inhuman Bondage: The Rise and Fall of Slavery in the New World, David Brion Davis points out that although American politicians shut down the transatlantic slave trade in 1808, temperate climate and plentiful food would keep the slave population thriving (while in other parts of the New World, such as the West Indies, slave mortality was much higher.)
Of course, if "white" people are sometimes "black," the opposite is also true. The study also revealed an average of about 17-18% European admixture in African Americans. Black people are white and white people are black. So much for the one-drop rule.
In the end, it's not the color of your skin after all; it's the content of your genetic character. But in fact that content is about 85% the same, no matter our ethnic origins. That is, we are genetically more similar than we are distinct. Despite the academia-born trend to "celebrate diversity," genetically anyway, we have a lot more homogeneity to celebrate. |
Email Katrina Voss |
|
'
FAQ
Search
Register
Log in
