The Ancient Egypt and Egyptology Forum of this message board is absolutely dominated by the subject of race.
I have heard from many people on the board give their opinions on the subject.
Even while it has been dually accepted by most that Ancient Egypt (Km.t) was an African civilization, founded and carried by an indegenious people who happened to be of a tropically adapted variety of people (i.e. Black Africans), I don't believe it has been widely agreed on how people view race.
I want to use this thread as an oppurtunity for posters to summarize their opinions, based on their research on what precisely is the nature of human variation and to what extent they do (or do not) acknowledge the scientfic validity of racial theories.
I've heard some say that racial taximonies are pseudo-scientific, but also believe that racial differences can be observed through physical performance, health relationships and behavioral patterns.
I've heard still others say that the entire theory of typological races has been categorically falsified and the racialist pursuit for proof that the theory is valid is a pseudo-scientific effort.
I'd like to see any and all arguments from those interested concerning their opinions on race and the sources they feel agree with their contentions.
Unfortunately most of them are somewhat vague, I'd like to see other sources as I know people have spent alot of time on this forum reading studies published in peer-reviewed journals. Myra hosts alot of great studies in PDF form on her webpage.
If anyone has any similar abstracts or PDFs they'd like to recommend in addition to their response to the topic that would be helpful to the discussion.
Posts: 1203 | From: USA | Registered: Feb 2005
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Race and ethnicity are self evident. The problem, as I see it, is in the social constructs invested in power and control. I am an immigrant to USA and whenevr I read North AMerican history, I am shocked that so many people who cliam they believe in freedom whould actually enslave others! That freedom was for only 1 group of people. Those who held/hold power. For almost 300 years, very few people who claimed freedom spoke out against that dichotomy! Why, vested interest!
Even on this board, we see influences of those who may know better but have been bamboozled by the trickery. Miseducation works and it sells!
I will start small here.
Posts: 1290 | From: usa | Registered: May 2005
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posted
Race is a social construct base don people arbitrarily groupimg other people based on looks. Ethnicity is grouping people based on cultural and ancestral ties. The moment you are using 'Black Peoples" even though it may not be a biological race claim, it is still a arbitrary grouping of people based on interpratation of similar looks. The fact is many of the people claimed as black are not nearly as dark to be considered 'Black' . Only some population even come close.
Posts: 163 | Registered: Mar 2006
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quote:Originally posted by SidiRom: Race is a social construct base don people arbitrarily groupimg other people based on looks. Ethnicity is grouping people based on cultural and ancestral ties. The moment you are using 'Black Peoples" even though it may not be a biological race claim, it is still a arbitrary grouping of people based on interpratation of similar looks. The fact is many of the people claimed as black are not nearly as dark to be considered 'Black' . Only some population even come close.
you could say the same for white,yellow or red. WHEN FOLKS mean black they are not just talking about skin tone but racial grouping. brazil as many races based on skin tone ,so that could get out of hand even more so.
If you have two parents who IS very dark and a kid who comes out lighter,that kid would still be black because of the parents and THE KID WOULD STILL HAVE THE SAME BASIC FEATURES EVEN IF the skin tone is lighter UNLESS OVER THE YEARS THEY BECCOME TRAP IT A HARSH CLIMATE LIKE EARLY EUROPE OR ASIA DURING THE LAST ICE AGE AND THE KIDS BECOME SOMETHING ELSE(THAT'S ARE WHITES AND EAST ASIANS CAME ABOUT TO MAKE IT SHORT)so i do not have a problem with the term black so many blacks would fit the term black as far as i am concern,UNLESS they do not look black and do not want to be part of that racial group.
Posts: 2688 | Registered: Jul 2004
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quote:kenndo: you have two parents who IS very dark and a kid who comes out lighter,that kid would still be black because of the parents and THE KID WOULD STILL HAVE THE SAME BASIC FEATURES EVEN IF the skin tone is lighter
sigh. please provide a scientific source confirming any aspect of what you just said.
Posts: 15202 | Registered: Jun 2004
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quote:Mansa Musaa wrote: use this thread as an oppurtunity for posters to summarize their opinions, based on their research on what precisely is the nature of human variation and to what extent they do (or do not) acknowledge the scientfic validity of racial theories.
AS for KM.t - Black people, it is and ethnic appellative like any other: Jew, Arab, blonde, white, Indian, etc..
It is not a race.
Race in biology is the concept of division of humanity into sub-species - in which phenotype denotes genotype. This concept is biologically invalid as applied to humans.
Posts: 15202 | Registered: Jun 2004
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quote:Originally posted by kenndo: you could say the same for white,yellow or red. WHEN FOLKS mean black they are not just talking about skin tone but racial grouping.
You are still assuming a race no matter what color and science has disproven the concept.
Posts: 36 | Registered: Mar 2006
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quote:Originally posted by rasol: AS for KM.t - Black people, it is and ethnic appellative like any other: Jew, Arab, blonde, white, Indian, etc..
It is not a race.
Race in biology is the concept of division of humanity into sub-species - in which phenotype denotes genotype. This concept is biologically invalid as applied to humans.
And the concept as KM.t as refering to a Black people has been rebutted many times.
Jacques Kinnaer:
quote:km : "(to be) black" Used as a substantive (km in masculine, km.t in feminine/neutral) it means "the black one". A determinative (see my "writing" pages to learn more about determinatives) can help determine what it is they are decribing as "the black one". If the determinative were to represent a cow, km.t could mean "the black cow". When it represents a city-wall, it indicates a geographical name, "the Black Land", one of the names the Egyptians used to indicate their country.
The Egyptians sometimes refered to themselves als km.tj.w, "those belonging to the Black land". The word is derived from km.t, the "Black Land".
The claims that km.t would mean "Land of the Black" with "black" being a reference to the colour of the skin of the Ancient Egyptians, can be refuted with several arguments: if we need to translate as "Land of the Black" the correct spelling would be km.tj. Although j at the end words is a weak consonant that can be dropped in writing, it is at the very least strange that we have found no writing at all of the word for "Egypt" ending with j. It also only rarely happens that the j of the ending .tj is not written. In addition, the Ancient Egyptians would then need to refer to themselves as km.tj.jw which also never occurs the Egyptian vocabulary distinguished Egyptians from the neighbouring peoples. The Egyptians were rmT, or km.tj.w. The Lybians were THn.w, the Asiatics (Semites) were st.tj.w and the Nubians were nHs.jw. This means that the Egyptians did not associate themselves with any of the neighbouring peoples, feeling that they were different from them. the Egyptians depicted their men as brown skinned, the women as yellow skinned. The distinction between the two is an idealisation: men lived mainly outside, women inside ... Only poor women needed to work on the fields and had the same skin colour as men. The few statues and paintings that represent Egyptians with black skins (e.g. the funerary statue of Montuhotep II, or two statues of Tutankhamun found in his tomb) always have a funerary context. Black was the colour of fertile land from which all life sprang, and by representing the dead as black, they had the magical ability to come to life again. Note that both Montuhotep II and Tutankhamun are also usually represented with brown skins.
quote:AS for KM.t - Black people, it is and ethnic apellative like any other: Jew, Arab, blonde, white, Indian, etc..
Km.t - le noires, the Blacks, a reference to the people, not soil.
translation: Worterbuch der aegyptischen Sprache/Champollion
In 1897, Erman, working together with Sethe, Hans Grapow and other coworkers from all over the world, started to catalogue all the words from all the known Egyptian texts available; the result was an ensemble of about 1,500,000 datasheets that form the basis for the masterpiece of the ancient Egyptian lexicography, the famous Woerterbuch der aegyptischen Sprache, whose first five volumes were published between 1926 and 1931. The complete edition of this gigantic dictionary comprises a total of twelve volumes.Posts: 15202 | Registered: Jun 2004
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posted
No need to defend the Woerterbuch. Anyone disparaging it immediately flauts their ignorance of Pharaonic Egyptian language studies.
Unfortunately this forum often has to chase its tail reiterating points that were exhaustively examined earlier, like the AEs reckoning themselves as black in the exact same sense of all Nile Valley folk upriver from them.
quote:Originally posted by rasol: In 1897, Erman, working together with Sethe, Hans Grapow and other coworkers from all over the world, started to catalogue all the words from all the known Egyptian texts available; the result was an ensemble of about 1,500,000 datasheets that form the basis for the masterpiece of the ancient Egyptian lexicography, the famous Woerterbuch der aegyptischen Sprache, whose first five volumes were published between 1926 and 1931. The complete edition of this gigantic dictionary comprises a total of twelve volumes.
Posts: 8014 | From: the Tekrur in the Western Sahel | Registered: Feb 2006
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quote:the Egyptians depicted their men as brown skinned, the women as yellow skinned. The distinction between the two is an idealisation: men lived mainly outside, women inside ... Only poor women needed to work on the fields and had the same skin colour as men
This makes no sense because during the New Kingdom in the tomb of Nebamun both the nobel men and female are shown in realistic dark-brown skin coloring. I am sure one is familiar with the Fowlers in the Marshes scene. That is a picture of both Nebamun and his family. Both the wife of Nebamun and his female children are shown with dark brown skin coloring. The same goes with the tomb of Sennejemb.
Most of the artwork we have from the ancient Egyptians shows either the pharoah or nobel men or women,and few survive of the lower classes.
This whole concept that women stayed indoors;while mean worked is somewhat of a Victorian idealogy that modern Egyptologist try to force upon the ancient Egyptian society. Most likely the yellowish for females was symbolic. We do know that on average that in all populations women tend to be naturally lighter than their male counterparts.
quote:The few statues and paintings that represent Egyptians with black skins (e.g. the funerary statue of Montuhotep II, or two statues of Tutankhamun found in his tomb) always have a funerary context. Black was the colour of fertile land from which all life sprang, and by representing the dead as black, they had the magical ability to come to life again. Note that both Montuhotep II and Tutankhamun are also usually represented with brown skins.
While its true that the color ''black'' does denote funerary symbolism,but its a myth that no Egyptians were ever depicted with pitch black skin. You can see in the tombs of Rameses III there are examples. In a similar scene in a grape picking scene one of the Egyptian workers is shown with black skin coloring.
Also the clan of Mentuhotep II is said to have some Nubian origins.
Posts: 8675 | From: Tukuler al~Takruri as Ardo since OCT2014 | Registered: Feb 2003
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quote:Originally posted by rasol: Race in biology is the concept of division of humanity into sub-species - in which phenotype denotes genotype. This concept is biologically invalid as applied to humans.
I agree with this, it is direct and to the point.
However I've noticed an interesting point that was addressed in one of the articles I linked to.
quote:'Race': semantics and confusion The term 'race' engenders much discussion, with little agreement between those who claim that 'races' are real (meaning natural) biological entities and those who maintain that they are socially constructed1. The former group sometimes stresses empirical evidence for the existence of biological 'racial' differences, and the latter stresses the role that human agency has had in creating distinctions between people (on any level). Biologists also disagree about the meaning of 'race', and whether it is applicable to human infraspecific (within-species) variation
I've seen many studies come out recently that seem to continously support racial difference or are percieved to support such differences.
This one being the most popular:
quote:Genetic structure, self-identified race/ethnicity, and confounding in case-control association studies.
Division of Public Health Sciences, Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center, Seattle, WA, USA.
We have analyzed genetic data for 326 microsatellite markers that were typed uniformly in a large multiethnic population-based sample of individuals as part of a study of the genetics of hypertension (Family Blood Pressure Program). Subjects identified themselves as belonging to one of four major racial/ethnic groups (white, African American, East Asian, and Hispanic) and were recruited from 15 different geographic locales within the United States and Taiwan. Genetic cluster analysis of the microsatellite markers produced four major clusters, which showed near-perfect correspondence with the four self-reported race/ethnicity categories. Of 3,636 subjects of varying race/ethnicity, only 5 (0.14%) showed genetic cluster membership different from their self-identified race/ethnicity. On the other hand, we detected only modest genetic differentiation between different current geographic locales within each race/ethnicity group. Thus, ancient geographic ancestry, which is highly correlated with self-identified race/ethnicity--as opposed to current residence--is the major determinant of genetic structure in the U.S. population. Implications of this genetic structure for case-control association studies are discussed.
I mentioned the article before in your thread about Peter Underhill and Y chromosomes before, Rasol.
You offered a great rebuttle to the contentions that it proves the validity of typological race.
There are many articles out there that cover subjects concerning everything from genes being discovered that control brain size to race-based medicine to evidence that the human species is still evolving.
What I'm interested in seeing is if there are any significant peer-reviewed articles that counter the contention that any of these studies prove typological race.
Posts: 1203 | From: USA | Registered: Feb 2005
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quote:Originally posted by SidiRom: Race is a social construct base don people arbitrarily groupimg other people based on looks. Ethnicity is grouping people based on cultural and ancestral ties. The moment you are using 'Black Peoples" even though it may not be a biological race claim, it is still a arbitrary grouping of people based on interpratation of similar looks. The fact is many of the people claimed as black are not nearly as dark to be considered 'Black' . Only some population even come close.
So begs the question, how dark does one have to be to be considered 'black', Sid??
This Indian woman for instance is about as dark as many West Africans.
Is she not 'black' to you?
Posts: 26238 | From: Atlanta, Georgia, USA | Registered: Feb 2005
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I've referenced your site to any number of anti-Africanists and have yet to find anything beyound obtuse denial, or question begging, in the way of a rejoinder.
Posts: 15202 | Registered: Jun 2004
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quote:Originally posted by alTakruri: [QB] No need to defend the Woerterbuch. Anyone disparaging it immediately flauts their ignorance of Pharaonic Egyptian language studies.
Unfortunately this forum often has to chase its tail reiterating points that were exhaustively examined earlier, like the AEs reckoning themselves as black in the exact same sense of all Nile Valley folk upriver from them.
quote:Originally posted by Djehuti: So begs the question, how dark does one have to be to be considered 'black', Sid?? This Indian woman for instance is about as dark as many West Africans. Is she not 'black' to you? [/QB]
No she is not. How dark? Not dark at all. Vanessa Williams is black, This woman is not.
What makes someone Black? Self identification as Black. I don't buy into calling Africans Black. Only if they call themselves Black. Sorry, but there are actually a lot of us out there that don't buy into this black, White, Yellow, Red paradigm. Many Europeans I know get offended when you call them White, Many of my friends who are African know that they are refered to as Black, but they will tell you they are African, not Black. That is Eurocentric BS, and I don't buy into it.
Posts: 20 | Registered: Mar 2006
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To play the Devil's Advocate are you then saying that if this woman self-identified as Black then she'd be Black?
I've met several people from Trinidad of East Indian descent who identify as Black.
I had a conversation with one man in particular who was new to America and was curious about why people in the area (Washington D.C. Metro area) called each other the "N" Word, which in his country would be a very deragatory thing to say regardless of color.
He was several shades darker than myself and the average African-American in general and had straight hair and narrow features, was aware of his Indian heritage even recognizing people of African descent as a different group of people yet based Blackness on skin color.
I agree though, race is primarily based on 2 things:
1.Self-Identity
2.Social Perception
And sometimes those two factors are conflicting.
For instance Tiger Woods may reject the term African-American or Black as he feels it is two limiting a term for his diverse heritage. Most American however on appearance would consider Tiger to be a Black man whether they knew his ethnic background or not.
If any of you haven't taken this test, give it a try, it is eye opening.
quote:Originally posted by Mansa Musa: To play the Devil's Advocate are you then saying that if this woman self-identified as Black then she'd be Black?
100%
quote:I've met several people from Trinidad of East Indian descent who identify as Black.
I dated one. She was Black. She was raised as such. I also have another friend who does not (haven't dated her,but damn i would marry her. )
quote:I had a conversation with one man in particular who was new to America and was curious about why people in the area (Washington D.C. Metro area) called each other the "N" Word, which in his country would be a very deragatory thing to say regardless of color. He was several shades darker than myself and the average African-American in general and had straight hair and narrow features, was aware of his Indian heritage even recognizing people of African descent as a different group of people yet based Blackness on skin color.
Some do. Again, self determination. If I didn't see so much conflict in the evidence from Afrocentrics about Egyptians supposedly calling themselves Black, I would have no problem calling them Black. But to much evidence I have seen seems to point out that they did not. Which does not mean there were a ton of dark egyptians. They just didn't call themselves Black. In fact I don;t think i have seen ANY population that has called themselves Black without first being named so by some exterior lighter population.
quote:I agree though, race is primarily based on 2 things: 1.Self-Identity 2.Social Perception
One a sense of self identity (I would still question biological/racial beliefs, but not ethnic auto-denomination) The second is cultural imposition and has no validity to me. Just becausepeople attacked Sikhs thinking they were Arab did not make them Arab. Only if those Sikh ended identifying with the Arab plight and self identified as such, would they be Arab.
quote:And sometimes those two factors are conflicting. For instance Tiger Woods may reject the term African-American or Black as he feels it is two limiting a term for his diverse heritage. Most American however on appearance would consider Tiger to be a Black man whether they knew his ethnic background or not.
Many would, but it doesn't make it right. He could be confuse asan ethnic Thai just aseasilyby anyone who has been to Thailand. The Mani of Thailand Note the dark skinned Thais. Thai Boxer
quote:If any of you haven't taken this test, give it a try, it is eye opening. Race the Power of Illusion: Sorting People Try to match the people into the racial box you consider to be appropiate for them. You can click the image to view a bigger screen of the pic. [/QB]
I only messed up 2 Posts: 24 | Registered: Mar 2006
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It depends on what YOU consider to be wrong or right.
quote:He could be confuse asan ethnic Thai just aseasilyby anyone who has been to Thailand.
LOL Yes a black aboriginal Thai! LOL We have plenty in the Philippines also.
quote:The Mani of Thailand Note the dark skinned Thais. Thai Boxer
Yes, these people are 'dark' (and so am I) but not dark enough to be considered 'black'! In fact even we Southeast Asians would call aborigines terms like 'dark' or 'black'. Besides, that sepia darkened photo of the thai boxer won't help you! LOL
quote:Originally posted by Djehuti: Yes, these people are 'dark' (and so am I) but not dark enough to be considered 'black'! In fact even we Southeast Asians would call aborigines terms like 'dark' or 'black'. Besides, that sepia darkened photo of the thai boxer won't help you! LOL
In the interest of interjecting something completely irrelavent to the conversation I'd like to take this oppurtunity to give props to a great K-1 fighter from Thailand, Sombat "Buakaw" Banchamek.
Watch highlights of him upset the highly regarded defending defending champion Masato Kobayashi, of Japan, at the 2004 K-1 Max tournament.
But as far as the topic is concerned does anyone have any sources they'd like to share regarding the subject of race as a biological concept?
Posts: 1203 | From: USA | Registered: Feb 2005
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quote: There can be no doubt about it. The Ancient Egypt and Egyptology Forum of this message board is absolutely dominated by the subject of race...
There is no mystery as to why this is: For example, today I received an email in response to my website, which read innocently enough:
quote: Hello, Please, could you tell me what is your sources (book, magazine …) about race of ancient Egyptians? Best regards,
To which I responded
quote: If you look closely at the home page on my website it states "The Ancient Egyptian View of Race." The sources are from the Mdu Ntr (The Ancient Egyptian language) and reflect, unlike other sites, the Ancient Egyptian's own ideas about race; ethnicity; and where they were in all of this. My site also includes references which are merely complimentary sources that are used to substantiate the accuracy of my translations of the Mdu Ntr. Who but the Ancient Egyptians themselves would know what race they were?
Perhaps all of this is too simple for some people to grasp but more likely it is because they are not satisfied with the answers provided by the Ancient Egyptians themselves; so we end up in fruitless, diversionary discussions on what is race, does race exist, DNA, and other absolutely pointless discussions, and the essential points are talked around but remain the same: a) The Ancient Egyptians recognized the existance of distinctive races, to which they referred to as Families.
b) The Family to which they assigned themselves to and identified with was the Black family.
c) They made it quite clear that they were not remotely related to the Red families (ie, White folks), and indeed considered themselves to be the opposite of these peoples.
d) They were clear, precise, and explicit on all these matters regarding race in antiquity.
quote: pa Mesit
The Ancient Egyptians had a word which could mean "child, family, mankind, race... Also, in terms of phenotypes, they recognized that there were three clearly defined groups within the "mesu nebu" (human race) and they codified these distinctions in their ethnography:
a) A black-skinned group of which they divided between the Rmt (Egyptians) and the Nhsw (non-Egyptian black skinned peoples). (today we call these peoples - Rmt/Nhsw - "Africoid", "Blacks", "Negroids", or some other label, referring to essentially the same group.)
b)A brown or olive-skinned group to whom they collectively referred to as "Nomads;Sand-dwellers" ("Semites", "Arabs", "Middle-Easterners", "North African Caucasians"...)
c) A white skinned group to whom they collectively referred to as "Red peoples" (today we call these people "Whites", "Westerners", "Europeans") It seems that the Ancient Egyptians viewed social life in depth and dialectically (ie, not simplistically); every human being is identified as a member of a specific sex, a specific family, a specific clan, a specific social class or caste, a specific nationality, a specific culture, a specific race, and ultimately, a Human being ("Mesu Nebu")...
It is totally irrelevant (and arrogant) what moderns think of this Ancient Egyptian concept of race nor do we need to revise or update the ideology expressed by the peoples of Ancient Egypt (historical revisionism); that's another subject, for another forum!
And unless someone can scientifically refute the evidence presented, let us all move on to topics on Ancient Egyptian religion, culture, social practices, etc...
Posts: 3344 | From: Berkeley | Registered: Oct 2003
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quote:Originally posted by Wally: And unless someone can scientifically refute the evidence presented, let us all move on to topics on Ancient Egyptian religion, culture, social practices, etc...
That's likely never going to happen.
In any case this thread that I started has little to do with Ancient Egypt at all which is why I labeled it Off Topic.
I've read your site before it is very informative. This thread however is about the concept of race as an objective biological entity that can be used to scientifically categorize human beings into distinguishable groups.
Posts: 1203 | From: USA | Registered: Feb 2005
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quote:a) The Ancient Egyptians recognized the existance of distinctive races, to which they referred to as Families.
The catagories the Km.t created would most properly be denoted as a folk taxonomy.
A folk taxon is defined as a non scientific social classification system.
The Kemetic folk taxon is African in that it utilises the common denominators of red and black color dialectics, which are ethnic classifiers by and among many African peoples.
Whatever westerners like or dislike about this is irrelevant.
Objective scholarship requires understanding of ancient cultures, not imposition of modern ideology upon them.
Some Westerners are so used to making up fantasy-histories about other peoples [not just Africans], that they see nothing wrong with rewriting history to suit themselves.
Thus instead of discussing the native Km.t [Blacks] of the Nile Valley - we discuss North African CauCasians - an 18th century pseudo-scientific Eu-o-pean racial classification - which has neither scientific meaning nor social relevance to ancient Nile Valley Africa.
Posts: 15202 | Registered: Jun 2004
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posted
We are stuck on race because we have people like Salassan who cant seem to understand that Ancient Egyptians are black African. They tey to make the ancient egyptians mixed. Which to me is the easy way out. People hide behind the "mixed" label of ancient egyptian because they have a hard time sayuing the real truth about ancient egyptians that they were black africans. To me this forum debates race so much because people like Rasol, Thought, and Supercar have to repeat over and over to ignorant people what race the ancient egyptians are. I personally like the race debates because you always learn something new that you may not know. I have learned allot about the race of the ancient egyptians and I can say that I am not afraid to say that the ancient egyptians are black African. I am not even black and I try my best to make sure people know that it is not only black people who believe the ancient egyptians were black. I just wish we had some posters who don't agree that ancient egyptians were not black and made good posts to show that this is not the case. But these people who say that the Ancient Egyptians are not black usually resort to namecalling and turning into trolls. Like Salassan. If he debated the ancient egyptians were not black and actually debated this then I would have no problem with him. But instead he resorted to namecalling and turned into a troll. I just wish the otherside of the debate was not so quick to turn into trolls. But from using the search function and reading the old threads all the otherside do is turn to namecalling after Rasol, Thought, and Supercar put evidence. So it shows me that the other side just does not have proof of what they say so they have to make fun of the person. So in closing I say that the otherside can come to egyptsearch and prove that they have a arguement but don't resort to troll tactics when you are proven wrong. Also I would like to add that I don't look at anybody on egyptsearch as Afrocentric but truth centric.
Posts: 9651 | From: Reace and Love City. | Registered: Oct 2005
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quote:We are stuck on race because we have people like Salassan who cant seem to understand that Ancient Egyptians are black African
Many of the trolls who come and go on this forum do understand the above.
They simply argue by denial and distraction to at least forestall awareness of the truth if not to prevent it from being known.
It's when they get frustrated and resort to vulgarity, personal and blatant racist attacks, and trolling that you know they are utterly demoralised and defeated.
That's what happened to Horemheb, Evil Euro, etc. ad nauseum - and it will happen again.
Posts: 15202 | Registered: Jun 2004
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In the interest of interjecting something completely irrelavent to the conversation I'd like to take this oppurtunity to give props to a great K-1 fighter from Thailand, Sombat "Buakaw" Banchamek.
Watch highlights of him upset the highly regarded defending defending champion Masato Kobayashi, of Japan, at the 2004 K-1 Max tournament.
Yes, I am not at all surprised. Many martial artists from more northern parts of Asia would look down on Muay Thai fighting as well as Thais themselves and therefore underestimate Thai fighters.
Yet such people tend not to realize that Thai fighting may not be as fancy as karate or especially kung-fu, but it is a lot more raw and heavy. Thai fighters tend to take hits better than other martial artists. In fact, this seems to be a common feature in the martial arts of the Southeast. I have cousins who are experts in eskrima (Filipino martial arts) and have suffered rigorous training like limb destruction which can be seen in Muay Thai.
Many Thais like to brag about the fact that they have won many martial arts championships one after the other cuz their opponents get knocked out so easily.
Posts: 26238 | From: Atlanta, Georgia, USA | Registered: Feb 2005
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I've referenced your site to any number of anti-Africanists and have yet to find anything beyound obtuse denial, or question begging, in the way of a rejoinder.
Hmm, Africanist, now that is an interesting term.
I looked it up in the dictionary and got this discription.
quote:Africanist
n.
A specialist in African affairs, cultures, or languages.
Consider that term in contrast to Afrocentrist:
quote: Afrocentric
adj.
Centered or focused on Africa or African peoples, especially in relation to historical or cultural influence
Afrocentrist adj. & n.
The key word here appears to be influence.
Would you agree Rasol that the main intellectual difference between what you, Ausar and others purport as it relates to Africa and what Afrocentrists purport is that you are trying to represent African culture and people in an accurate context while Afrocentrists try to find African(Black) influence in any world culture they can find it in?
Posts: 1203 | From: USA | Registered: Feb 2005
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posted
mansa musa quote: _____________________________________________________________ Would you agree Rasol that the main intellectual difference between what you, Ausar and others purport as it relates to Africa and what Afrocentrists purport is that you are trying to represent African culture and people in an accurate context while Afrocentrists try to find African(Black) influence in any world culture they can find it in? ________________________________________________________
This is a false characterisation of Afrocentric researchers. Afrocentrists base the identification of African/Black influences on extra-African civilizations purely on the basis of archaeological, linguistic, anthropological and historical evidence supporting a relationship.
You don't know anything about the Afrocentric social sciences, except what is written by Eurocentrists. Below is an article that can help you understand the structure of Afrocentric social science. See:
Given your biased mind I doubt if you will even bother to read the piece. This will be your loss.
You should study the methodology and scientific results of Afrocentric research before you crticize something you know absolutely nothing about except through heresay. Shame on you!
...
-------------------- C. A. Winters Posts: 13012 | From: Chicago | Registered: Jan 2006
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quote:Would you agree Rasol that the main intellectual difference between what you, Ausar and others purport as it relates to Africa and what Afrocentrists purport is that you are trying to represent African culture and people in an accurate context while Afrocentrists try to find African(Black) influence in any world culture they can find it in?
I wouldn't say that because I can't define whatever it is "self described Afrocentrists" purport to be doing. That's for them to do.
Since I'm not and Afrocentrist, it isn't of any concern to me.
Posts: 15202 | Registered: Jun 2004
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As a Trini, colour has been influenced by both jati/varna (class/colour) of pre 1830's India and the Anglo-Saxon constructs of rule.
The Asian Indians who were brought to Trinidad (many also went to Surinam, Guyana, or Fiji) by the English in 1845 were often lumped with the Afrikans as "black" or "coloured". They were often the societal outcasts, the ones who despised English rule in India and other undesirables. The other word used was 'wog', a tern used to denigrate anyone how was not European! With socialization and a new self definition, some of the fairer Indians began to look away from the 'black label" while the phenotypically 'Afro-looking Indian" was forced to accept that blackness. How could they do otherwise? They were black for all purposes!
It's a worldwide problem this race ting? sooner or later some people will wake up.
Posts: 1290 | From: usa | Registered: May 2005
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quote:Originally posted by Djehuti: [quote]It depends on what YOU consider to be wrong or right.
No it goes by what THEY consider themselves.
quote:Yes a black aboriginal Thai! LOL We have plenty in the Philippines also.
Only Black by Eurocentric or Afrocentric racial standards. So you must be one of those Afrocentric Pinoys like Manansala. Let me guess, West Coast?
quote:Yes, these people are 'dark' (and so am I) but not dark enough to be considered 'black'! In fact even we Southeast Asians would call aborigines terms like 'dark' or 'black'. Besides, that sepia darkened photo of the thai boxer won't help you! LOL
LOL. Now you play with darkness as defining Blackness yet you would call ALL Egyptians Black or a medium skinned Aborigine girl Black. The hypocricy is highly amusing.
quote:I bet you did, considering you are just as mixed-up as they can come. [/QB]
You are the Afrocentric Filipino and I'm the confused one.
quote:Originally posted by Mansa Musa:
Note his features alongside. The Olmec head Yet people would quickly say The Olmec statue looks Black and he doesn't.
Ah the hypocricy is so entertaining.
(I don't think either do, just pointing the inconsistencies.)
Posts: 24 | Registered: Mar 2006
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quote:Originally posted by banned troll: No it goes by what THEY consider themselves.
partly, but there are many factors involved including society. On the other hand, if a jet-black Sudanese who suffered from some type of psychotic dillusion considered himself white, then I guess YOU would agree with him, huh? LOL
quote:Only Black by Eurocentric or Afrocentric racial standards. So you must be one of those Afrocentric Pinoys like Manansala. Let me guess, West Coast?
LOL
Uhh.. No! Filipinos have always called Negritos 'itim' meaning black or dark, long before any European encounters. And I'm from the east coast.
Wrong on both counts! Try again!
quote:LOL. Now you play with darkness as defining Blackness yet you would call ALL Egyptians Black or a medium skinned Aborigine girl Black.
There is no 'playing' about it. Darkness IS how one defines 'blackness' and yes, pretty much all if not most ancient Egyptians would fit into that category and yes even the 'medium'-skinned aborigine if she was dark enough. Most aborigines who are heavily mixed with Europeans actually resemble East Asians in complexion though.
quote:The hypocricy is highly amusing.
Yes, YOUR hypocrisy is amusing indeed! LMAO
quote:You are the Afrocentric Filipino and I'm the confused one.
If I'm an 'afrocentric' because of my definitions of 'black' then so is almost everyone in the country and in the Western world and pretty much the globe (including Eurocentrics, and white supremacists such as the KKK and Neonazis)! LMAOH
quote:Note his features alongside. The Olmec head
We moreso note your stupidity!
quote:Yet people would quickly say The Olmec statue looks Black and he doesn't.
Yet you would call fair-skinned Vanessa Williams black, but not a south Indian as dark as a Senegalese!
quote:Ah the hypocricy is so entertaining.
Not as entertaining as your stupidity!
quote:(I don't think either do, just pointing the inconsistencies.)
We have already pointed out YOURS time and time again! Posts: 26238 | From: Atlanta, Georgia, USA | Registered: Feb 2005
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quote:Originally posted by Wally: And unless someone can scientifically refute the evidence presented, let us all move on to topics on Ancient Egyptian religion, culture, social practices, etc...
That's likely never going to happen.
In any case this thread that I started has little to do with Ancient Egypt at all which is why I labeled it Off Topic.
I've read your site before it is very informative. This thread however is about the concept of race as an objective biological entity that can be used to scientifically categorize human beings into distinguishable groups.
There are numerous forums on the Internet that deal with questions of Biology, Anthropology, Race, etc. This forum is too encumbered with this topic of "race," which merely reflects the chagrin of those irritated by the fact of Ancient Egypt being a Black civilization... I suspect also, that it's an easy topic for those who have little knowledge of "Ancient Egypt and Egyptology." And I'm not talking about you ...
Posts: 3344 | From: Berkeley | Registered: Oct 2003
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quote:a) The Ancient Egyptians recognized the existance of distinctive races, to which they referred to as Families.
The catagories the Km.t created would most properly be denoted as a folk taxonomy.
A folk taxon is defined as a non scientific social classification system.
The Kemetic folk taxon is African in that it utilises the common denominators of red and black color dialectics, which are ethnic classifiers by and among many African peoples.
Whatever westerners like or dislike about this is irrelevant.
Objective scholarship requires understanding of ancient cultures, not imposition of modern ideology upon them.
Some Westerners are so used to making up fantasy-histories about other peoples [not just Africans], that they see nothing wrong with rewriting history to suit themselves.
Thus instead of discussing the native Km.t [Blacks] of the Nile Valley - we discuss North African CauCasians - an 18th century pseudo-scientific Eu-o-pean racial classification - which has neither scientific meaning nor social relevance to ancient Nile Valley Africa.
While I agree with the gist of your response, I would strongly disagree with your description of Ancient Egyptian ethnography as being a "non scientific social classification system." To me, that statement seems to imply that "modern" science is superior to ancient science, or even that the ancients did not even have the scientific method - (IE, "new is always improved and better"; which is a fallacy, of course)...
Lest we forget
a) Kemet was, and remains, the most nearly perfect civilization ever created by man.
b) There has, to my knowledge, not been any structure(s) created by any other civilization that equals the engineering precision (by degree of error) of the Great Pyramid (and I would argue, other Kemetu buildings as well).
c) Has any subsequent civilization been able to duplicate or even improve on the preservation of the dead? (A good argument would be the method used to preserve the bodies of Lenin, Mao, Ho Chi Minh, Kenyatta, Nkrumah, etc.; but we're still playing "catch up")
Kemet was a society that had scientists (both applied and social), engineers, institutions of higher learning (Anzeba), etc... They were hardly "folksy"
...I could go on, but... Posts: 3344 | From: Berkeley | Registered: Oct 2003
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Note his features alongside. The Olmec head Yet people would quickly say The Olmec statue looks Black and he doesn't.
Ah the hypocricy is so entertaining.
(I don't think either do, just pointing the inconsistencies.)
Yeah, and?
Salsassin, you talk out of two sides of your mouth when you harp about the subjectivity of the term Black, then the objectvity of who is non-Black then do a 180 and talk about the objectivity of people being mixed.
Then you want to talk about hypocrisy?
How can one believe in mixed people without believing in pure people?
You simply can't.
You also posted this study once:
quote:On the Concept of Biological Race and Its Applicability to Humans
Kaplan, Jonathan and Pigliucci, Massimo (2002) On the Concept of Biological Race and Its Applicability to Humans.
Biological research on race has often been seen as motivated by or lending credence to underlying racist attitudes; in part for this reason, recently philosophers and biologists have gone through great pains to essentially deny the existence of biological human races. We argue that human races, in the biological sense of local populations adapted to particular environments, do in fact exist; such races are best understood through the common ecological concept of ecotypes. However, human ecotypic races do not in general correspond with `folk` racial categories, largely because many similar ecotypes have multiple independent origins. Consequently, while human natural races exist, they have little or nothing in common with `folk` races.
All the talk you do about being against the concept of typological race as well as racial euphemisms, and endorsing the work of Keita but what does the paper actually say?
quote:Part of the reason undoubtedly has to do with the history of the term ‘‘race’’ as it is applied to humans. Insofar as one is asking a question not about the existence of biologically significant races (of the sort that exist in certain species of Drosophila, for example) but rather about the existence of a biological justification for the ‘‘ordinary’’ language racial categories, the concept of race appealed to will have to be quite strong. As, for example, Appiah (1996) and Hull (1998) point out, the races colloquially appealed to are generally supposed to differ from each other not merely in one particular adaptive trait, but in many traits simultaneously (a kind of racial ‘‘essentialism’’ and, as Hull notes, a throw-back to typological thinking). Knowing someone’s (biological) race, on this view, would permit one to make accurate predictions about a wide range of traits they possess—as Keita and Kittles put it, that ‘‘visible human variation connotes fundamental deep differences within the species, which can be packaged into units of nearuniform individuals’’ (1997, 534). This, however, will likely be impossible if there is little systematic between-population genetic variation compared to variation within the populations in question, and is in any event biologically unrealistic. Very few if any species have subpopulations that form groups of that sort, and the search for such groups seems to be a holdover of pre-Darwinian typological thinking (Futuyma 1998). So while the amount and distribution of genetic variation is largely irrelevant to the question of whether a species is divided into biologically significant races generally, it is relevant to the question of whether ‘‘ordinary’’ conceptions of folk racial categories in humans have any biological support, and to this question there is a broad consensus that the answer is ‘‘no.’’ Biology, it has been rightly noted many times, cannot underwrite the sort of racial concepts that have usually been applied to humans. This answer, though, is often mistakenly thought to imply that there are no biologically significant human races at all, or at least that folk races must be utterly unrelated to biologically interesting human populations. While it seems clear that biologically meaningful races will not correspond particularly well to folk racial categories, this does not imply that folk racial categories are completely orthogonal to biologically meaningful racial categories. However, insofar as there is evidence that biologically significant human races exist, that evidence points towards most biologically meaningful human races being quite a bit smaller (and far more numerous) than are folk races; the idea that those groups picked out by folk races and those populations that form biological races will not, in general, correspond is therefore likely correct. And of course, as has already been noted, insofar as folk races are supposed to pick out populations that systematically differ from each other over a wide range of genetic and phenotypic measures, biology provides no support for the existence of such populations (and indeed, provides evidence that no such populations exist).
The paper itself appears to clearly be in disagreement with geneticists such as Peter Underhill and Rick Kittles and bio-anthropologists such as Shomarka Keita and Loring Brace.
Indeed the paper is about denouncing formerly discredited folk races and replacing them with a concept of race that turns clines, ecotypes and populations into euphemisms for their own version of biological race.
It is rather pseudo-scientific, but hides under the guise that it "does not support racism", as a defense for skeptics.
Your point about the Olmec heads is a strawmen, other people's biases entertain you but what about your own?
Everyone wants to point fingers at everyone else and say that they are being objective.
You call Djehuti an Afrocentric Filipino.
You appear to be a Multi-racialist Latino.
Posts: 1203 | From: USA | Registered: Feb 2005
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quote:While I agree with the gist of your response, I would strongly disagree with your description of Ancient Egyptian ethnography as being a "non scientific social classification system."
Can you add substance to said disagreement by proving that Km.t folk taxons are scientifically valid?
quote:To me, that statement seems to imply that "modern" science is superior to ancient science
But of course that is a false dichotomy.
1stly as the distinction is between taxon and social [folk] taxon - mirroring the disctinction between science and social science, and not between ancient and modern.
2ndly - science is based on formulating theoretical understandings of natural phenomenon subject to verification and falsification. In this sense all science is contemporary.
Folk taxonomy is classification based on cultural tradition, and need not be subject to the necessarily contemporary rigours of science.
You have correctly shown us that the Km.t had a folk taxonomy.
If you are implying that it is also a scientifically valid taxon in biology - the you must produce current peer review sources in biology to affirm this.
Posts: 15202 | Registered: Jun 2004
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quote:Originally posted by Wally: There are numerous forums on the Internet that deal with questions of Biology, Anthropology, Race, etc. This forum is too encumbered with this topic of "race," which merely reflects the chagrin of those irritated by the fact of Ancient Egypt being a Black civilization... I suspect also, that it's an easy topic for those who have little knowledge of "Ancient Egypt and Egyptology." And I'm not talking about you ...
I agree.
As this topic appears to be getting repeatedly derailed, can someone in the know point me in the direction of such a board?
And please don't say Dodona Forums. Posts: 1203 | From: USA | Registered: Feb 2005
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quote:Originally posted by Mansa Musa: You call Djehuti an Afrocentric Filipino.
You appear to be a Multi-racialist Latino.
LOL His reason for calling me 'Afrocentric' is because I acknowledge peoples like Dravidians, Negritos, Australian natives, Negritos, and Melanesians black (thus, black people around the world)!!
As if one has to be 'afrocentric' to call these peoples black! So I suppose all the white racists who more than acknowledge these people as black are 'afrocentrics' too?! LMAOPosts: 26238 | From: Atlanta, Georgia, USA | Registered: Feb 2005
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quote:Originally posted by Mansa Musa: You call Djehuti an Afrocentric Filipino.
You appear to be a Multi-racialist Latino.
LOL His reason for calling me 'Afrocentric' is because I acknowledge peoples like Dravidians, Negritos, Australian natives, Negritos, and Melanesians black (thus, black people around the world)!!
As if one has to be 'afrocentric' to call these peoples black! So I suppose all the white racists who more than acknowledge these people as black are 'afrocentrics' too?! LMAO
Yeah it is a dull argument.
These groups of people have similar enough features and skin tone that they are consistent with the what is commonly called a Black phenotype (obviously since they are people who retained their tropical adaptations which their ancestors originally developed in tropical Africa.
If you were to dress people from the above listed ethnic groups in Urban clothing and they got arrested by police, when the officer gives a police description they are going to go by appearance and call that person a Black male/female.
I guess the policemen are just subconciously Afrocentric.
I agree with Salsassin only in as much as it relates to the subjectvity of the term Black and that it is commonly denoted in the West to be for anyone of known West African ancestry.
Where he veers into the land of absurdity is when he refuses to acknowledge that the way we use Black on this board is also for the most part objective and he is very opiniated about who should and should not be considered Black.
In Richard Poe's blog he stated that East Africans should not be considered Black because they never identified as such and though such a term was attributed to them because of skin color a different term was attributed to West Africans meaning Black. He said some kind nonsense like that.
quote: While I agree that Power's comments are nonsensical, the concept of Ethiopians being Negro or Black or negroid based on the perception of America is flawed as well.
The USA has suffered from one-droppism for so long that even a person of 1/8 African ancestry is seen as Black. Therefore the phenotype variation in American perception would be as great.
But in Africa, when the original terms originated, the nigritae, as Romans called them, were of a specific region, West Africa. They had other names for other groups. In fact, the original term for Black in Latin was Ater. Niger was adopted when the Romans encountered the Berber tribes of North Africa and they called the Niger river the Gher-n-Gher. River of rivers. The river happened to be dark and so were the people around it who ended up being called the Nigritae.
It is from this group of people that the term Negro would arise. So it was originally ethnospecific. And while it expanded to include other groups with similar phenotypes, it never became a simile in any learned circle for any sub-Saharan African.The KhoiSan, Mbuti, and yes, the Ethiopians, were seen as different groups.
Now genetic tests have shown that Ethiopians have KhoiSan, Nilotic, Dravidian and Arab ancestries. Needless to say, while some closed-minded people might throw them all together, most anthropologists do not, and neither do they themselves consider themselves the same. That many will embrace such a concept after encountering racism in the USA does not justify imposing such racial terms on them over there.
Many Melanesians also consider themselves Black, after encountering racism in the USA. It doesn't mean they are culturally, genetically or even phenotypically "Black." Black is a social construct, and all those who grew up under the term are Black, but to then try to impose that image onto those present or past who never lived under the moniker, nor where the ancestors of a majority population that lives under the moniker doesn't make sense. Black does not equate to African. Black equates to racial stereotypification imposed on many Africans.
posted
This who is black, we can't accurately define a black, etc., nonsense keeps you on the defensive. Time to spin and flip it and ask who is white, how do we define a white, the people of E Europe aren't white, the people of Mediterraean Europe aren't white, ad nausea.
Stop letting them point the direction for you to go.
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