Definition of race
Definition of raceThe word �race� is defined as one of the group of populations constituting humanity. Upon a first glance, the word seems easy enough to understand. However, what are these groups, and how does one categorize them? Who fits where, and why? These questions among others arise when thinking of race. Does race really exist? Genetically, a race may be defined as a group with gene frequencies differing from those of the other groups in the human species, although the genes in question make up a tiny percentage of the total human genome. The term race is inappropriate when applied to national, religious, or cultural groups, nor can the biological criteria of race be equated with mental characteristics (intelligence, personality, and character). Races arose in response to mutation, selection, geographic adaptation, and genetic drift; racial differentiation occurred relatively late in history. In the 19th and early 20th century, Joseph Arthur Gobineau and Houston Stewart Chamberlain attributed cultural and psychological values to race, proposing theories of racial superiority, an approach that culminated in the vicious racial doctrines of Nazi Germany. By limiting the criteria to certain physical characteristics, anthropologists at one time agreed on the existence of three relatively distinct groups of people, namely Caucasoid, Mongoloid, and Negroid, distinguished by such traits as skin color, hair type and color, shape of body, head, and facial features, and blood traits. Today, however, there is no scientific basis whatsoever for a general classification of races according to a scale of relative superiority, and racial prejudices and myths are no more than a means of finding a scapegoat when the position of individuals and the cohesion of a group are threatened. Anthropologists stress the heterogeneity of world population, and many reject the concept of race outright. This concept is not understood by most, and must be emphasized to people around the world. This would create unity the world over simply by pointing out that race does not exist.
In order to fully understand this concept, the history of the word �race� must be analyzed. Throughout history, it is a matter of observation that people are not alike in appearance; there are variations in the external physical characteristics transmitted wholly or partially from parent to child. It goes as far back as the Old Testament, which one already finds the belief that the physical and mental differences between individuals and groups alike are congenital, hereditary, and unchangeable. The Book of Genesis contains passages apparently assuming the inferiority of certain groups to others. However, the word �race� was first used in the 17th century with the discovery of the New World. However, the modern definition was created in order to define �differences� in humans. Europeans imposed these meanings and definitions according to their own historical understandings and perceptions of the world around them (Smedley 37). Somewhere along the line, they began to...
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