The Concept of Race Essay

Nowadays, it became a commonplace practice among many social scientists to refer to the concept of race, as an essentially social construct. That is, they believe it came into being on the account of representatives of European elites striving to retain their social dominance in the Europe. As Arnesen noted, “One common denominator of most whiteness studies is a core belief in the ‘social construction of race’… scholars remind us that race has no biological or genetic basis’.^[1]

Such a point of view, however, cannot be referred to as representing an undeniable truth value, because there is a plenty of empirical evidence as to the fact that the concept of race may indeed be considered thoroughly objective, in social and biological senses of this word. In our paper, we will aim to substantiate the validity of this suggestion at length, while outlining the historical aspects of how the notion of race came into being and elaborating on what may account for the implications of race studies in the future.

For historians, it does not represent much of a secret that Europeans used to be be endowed with the rudimentary awareness of their racial affiliation, as early as during the course of the Dark Ages. This awareness, however, had clearly defined cultural and religious undertones to it. According to Baum, “Medieval Europeans… emphasized cultural criteria of (racial) difference and lacked any clearly developed notion of ‘fixed natures’ of different descent groups”.^[2]

In essence, Medieval Europeans used to think of themselves as ‘cultured people’, while referring to everybody else, beyond the boundaries of Christendom, as ‘uncultured barbarians’. However, it would be quite inappropriate to think of such a tendency, on their part, as having been nothing but solely the extrapolation of their cultural and religious arrogance.

Apparently, it was the fact that most Europeans never ceased professing the so-called ‘Faustian’ values, based upon the assumption that, “Individual’s willpower must never cease combating obstacles… and that the conflict is the essence of existence”^[3], which naturally prompted them to think of people, emotionally detached from these values, as being inferior.

The reason for this is simple – one’s endowment with the ‘Faustian’ mentality is a necessary precondition for him or her to be able to push forward cultural and scientific progress. In its turn, people’s affiliation with the concept of progress automatically empowers them. Consequently, it naturally predisposes them towards exploiting underpowered ‘aliens’, especially if they happened to be visually notable.

This simply could not be otherwise, because just as it is being the case with plants and animals, the representatives of the Homo Sapiens species never cease being subjected to the laws of nature. And, as we are now being well aware of, the foremost evolutionary principle is being concerned with the living organisms’ strive to expand their living space.

In its turn, this points out to the objective nature of European Colonialism, which created objective preconditions for the emergence of a scientific racism in the latter centuries, “Africans and other non-Europeans were initially enslaved not so much because of their color and physical type as because of their legal and cultural vulnerability”.^[4]

In other words, even though that the institutionalization of slavery did contribute towards the strengthening of a racial consciousness in Caucasians, it cannot be referred to as such a consciousness’s actual trigger.

This is exactly the reason why the emergence of a number of racial theories, during the course of 17^th-20^th centuries, appears to have been inspired by White intellectuals’ desire to explain the Western civilization’s geopolitical dominance (power), rather than to simply maintain it. And, just as it was the case with other scientific theories, as time went on, the racial theory continued to become ever more intellectually refined.

For example, one of the European earliest proto-racialists, William Petty used to refer to the ‘fixed’ morphological discrepancies between men, as being reflective of God’s ‘design’. According to Petty, just as it is being the case with a hierarchical gradation of ‘heavenly beings’ in the ‘kingdom of heaven’, people are also graded, in regards to what happened to be their actual ‘worth’, “Placeing Man on the top of the lower scale, I make many sorts or species of Comparisons between him and his Inferior animalls, downe to the lowest”.^[5]

Even though that another prominent proto-racialist of the era, François Bernier used to be just as religiously-minded as Petty, he nevertheless proposed that the race-related morphological differences among people are rather environmentally then ‘divinely’ predetermined.

As he noted, “Although the Egyptians… are very black, or rather copper-colored, that color is only an accident in them, and it comes because they are constantly exposed to the sun”.^[6] Nevertheless, as European intellectuals were gaining a better understanding of the nature of a surrounding reality, they were growing increasingly aware of the fact that racial phenotypes are not being merely concerned with the particulars of people’s physical appearance, but also with the qualitative essence of how people address life’s challenges.

After all, throughout the course of the Exploration Era, when Europeans used to travel to the Earth’s furthermost corners, in a search of new lands, they were unable to find even a single indigenous culture/civilization that would equal Western civilization, in terms of scientific, cultural or social achievements.

Therefore, it does not come as a particular surprise that by the mid-18^th century, people’s biological inequality became a well-suspected fact. This was the actual reason why, during the course of the 18^th-19th centuries, it started to account for a commonplace practice among European scientists to refer to the principle of living organisms’ hierarchical ranking, as such that had clearly defined societal implications.

Apparently, European intellectuals of the era simply could not help noticing the fact that people’s ability to act as the agents of civilization is being reflective of their morphological constitution. That is, the more there are atavistic features to a particular individual’s appearance (broad nose, dark skin, curly hair, bulging eyes, wide cheeks, sloped forehead), the less such an individual is likely to profess the ideals of Western rationale-based (civilized) living, and vice versa.

Therefore, it is fully explainable why strong racialist overtones could be found even in the works of the18^th century’s empirical scientists, such as Carl Linnaeus, for example. While referring to the ideological significance of Linnaeus’s intellectual legacy, Sloan stated, “For Linnaeus… one could follow a line of descent within the human species from Homo Sapiens Albus [white European] to Sapiens Afer [black African]”.^[7]

In its turn, this brings us to the discussion of why, despite the fact that the 18^th century’s European prominent intellectuals used to endorse the idea of egalitarianism, they nevertheless remained skeptical, as to whether this idea applied to non-Whites.

After all, even such an ardent supporter of ‘people’s equality’ as Voltaire was known for his tendency to refer to Black people as being inferior to Whites, “The Negro race is a species of men as different from ours as the breed of spaniels is from that of greyhounds… Their understanding is… at least greatly inferior”.^[8]

The same could be said about another famous promoter of ‘people’s equality’ of the era – Thomas Jefferson. In all probability, it never even occurred to this particular America’s founding father that the Blacks were endowed with as many human rights as the Whites were.

Apparently, the fact that during the course of the earlier mentioned historical era, many European and American intellectuals/political figures tended to combine seemingly irreconcilable ideas of people’s racial inequality and egalitarianism, suggests that rather than being solely ‘instrumental’, these individuals’ racialist convictions were indeed genuine.

In other words, it was namely their observations of what accounts for the particulars of people’s behavioral mode, which served the 18^th century’s racialists as a theoretical framework, within which they went about prescribing higher/lesser humanity to the representatives of both: non-White and White populations.

In its turn, this also explains why, despite their formal ‘whiteness’, Irish people used to be treated by the representatives of Anglo-Saxon (Nordic) elites as somewhat ‘less White’. According to Bronwen, “A key aspect of the constructions of Irishness is the paradox by which the Irish are represented… as ‘other’, and also the ‘same’ because ‘White’ people share a similar timeless essence”.^[9]

Apparently, Anglo-Saxons (the descendants of Aryans that invaded Europe around 5000 B.C.) never ceased experiencing a psychological incompatibility with the Irish (the descendants of Europe’s pre-Aryan autochthonous populations).

The reason for this is simple – whereas, Anglo-Saxons appear to be endowed with ‘Faustian’ mentality (the qualitative characteristics of which have been outlined earlier), the majority of autochthonous Irish are being endowed with genetically predetermined ‘Apollonian’(Paleoeuropean) mentality.

In its turn, this explains why the Irish have traditionally been known for their fanatical stubbornness, attitudinal arrogance, adherence to ritualistic traditions, dislike of intellectual pursuits, violent-mindedness, and their pretentious ‘seriousness’ (many representatives of Europe’s autochthonous populations, such as Irish, Corsicans, Basques and Scots, appear to lack a sense of humor).

The fact that, despite their ‘whiteness’, the Irish used to exhibit clearly primordial psychological traits, created objective preconditions for the 19^th century’s scientists to begin suspecting that there are in fact a few ‘races’ within the White race.

For example, French zoologist Georges Cuvier used to classify Whites as such that fall into three distinctive ‘sub-racial’ categories: Armenians, Indians and Scythians, with the representatives of each sub-category possessing unique psychological traits. British physiologist William Lawrence, on the other hand, used to divide White people into Celts, Germanics and Slavs, while implying that Germanics were vastly superior to their ‘brethrens in White race’.

American physiologist Samuel Norton came up with a similar idea, while categorizing ‘Caucasians’, as the representatives of morphologically distinctive Persian and Pelasgic ‘sub-races’. Even though Morton regarded the Irish as an integral part of the Caucasian race, he nevertheless appears to have been aware of the Celts’ Paleoeuropean roots, “The most unsophisticated Celts… whose wild look and manner, mud cabins and funereal howlings, recall the memory of a barbarous age”.^[10]

As time went on, euro-centric racial theories were becoming influenced by the contemporary anthropological data, as to how people’s physiognomic characteristics reflect the subtleties of their existential mode. In its turn, this allowed one of the America’s most prominent racial scientists Madison Grant to design his own scale for people’s racial evaluation.

This scale was based upon politically incorrect but thoroughly scientific (especially in light of recent breakthroughs in the field of genetics) idea that, “Moral, intellectual and spiritual attributes are as persistent as physical characters and are transmitted substantially unchanged from generation to generation”.^[11]

According to Grant, the specifics of one’s anthropological constitution directly relate to the making of his or her character. This is why Grant’s system of racial classification of Caucasians, contained anthropological and psychological provisions for defining the representatives of Nordic, Mediterranean and Alpine sub-races.

Apparently, despite the accusations of being racist, Grant’s theory even today provides us with the insight into the very essence of historical dialectics, as much as it provides us with the better understanding of what accounts for the triggering of ethnic conflicts throughout the world.

The validity of this statement can be illustrated in regards to the 1994 genocide in Rwanda, when close to a million of Tutsi tribesmen had been murdered by Hutu tribesmen, simply because Tutsi people happened to have narrower noses – hence, their perceived ‘whiteness’.

It is understood, of course, that the close analysis of 18^th – 19^th centuries’ racial theories will reveal many of the theoretical claims largely erroneous.

Nevertheless, the foremost theoretical premise, upon which classic racial theories used to be based – namely, the assumption that the particulars of people’s physical appearance do in fact reflect the workings of their psyche, even today remains thoroughly valid. Moreover, the validity of this assumption can be easily illustrated in regards to the most recent scientific discoveries in the field of biology/genetics.

After all, as it was shown by Lynn and Vanhanen, the qualitative subtleties of people’s sense of self-identity are being reflective of their varying ability to operate with abstract categories (IQ). In its turn, the rate of people’s IQ has long ago been proven genetically predetermined.^[12] Moreover, the rate of one’s IQ can be well discussed as such that reflects the specifics of his or her anthropological constitution, which is being defined by the concerned individual’s racial phenotype.

Therefore, under no circumstances may the concept of race be defined merely in terms of a social construct. In fact, the notion of ‘race’ can be best conceptualized in terms of a ‘behavioral software’, which defines the qualitative aspects of how racially diverse individuals position themselves in life. Race is not about the variations in the skin’s coloring – it is about how people perceive surrounding reality and their place in it.

In their turn, the qualitative characteristics of people’s cognitive perception appear to reflect the subtleties of their DNA-makeup. In human DNA, there are 46 chromosomes, with the half of them being inherited from a father and another from a mother.

Out of 23 chromosomes, passed to an individual from his/her father, in Y-chromosome (in males there are Y and X chromosomes, in females only X-chromosome) there is a combination of nucleotides that continues to be passed from generation to generation for thousands of years, without undergoing any transformation, whatsoever.

This is what biologists refer to as one’s haplogroup – a modern equivalent of the 19^th century’s concept of race. The density of information, contained in DNA, can be best defined as being rather enormous (with every nucleotide being responsible for defining the individual’s particular physical or mental characteristic).

This is the reason why it now became a scientifically legitimate assumption that a particular person’s physical and psychological characteristics cannot be discussed outside of what happened to be his or her haplogroup.^[13] As of today, the haplo-maps of the world’s different regions are easily available for public access. In its turn, the analysis of these maps exposes the essential validity of racial insights, on the part of 19^th century’s racialists, such as Madison Grant.

For example; whereas, prior to 2001 (when first haplo-maps have been compiled), the earlier mentioned psychological characteristics of Irish people used to be commonly referred to in terms of a ‘racist stereotyping’, this can no longer be the case today.

This is because it has now been well proven that 85% of Irish citizens are the bearers of Paleoeuropean haplogroup Y1, which prior to Aryan invasions (haplogroups R1a and R1b), used to dominate the Europe’s genetic landscape – hence, the particulars of Irish people’s existential uniqueness.

Moreover, the very notion of ‘Aryan race’, which during the course of 20^th century’s second half has been ostracized, due to being ‘unscientific’, appears fully scientific in light of what haplo-maps tell us (the path of Aryan invasions can now be traced genetically and not merely linguistically). Also, the analysis of these maps reveals an undeniable fact there are indeed a few ‘races’ within the White race– just as the 19^th century’s racial scientists were suggesting.

Therefore, there can be no good reasons to think of the concept of ‘race’ as being thoroughly irrelevant. Quite on the opposite – it appears to be only the matter of time, before people’s interest in researching race-related issues will be revived. The very course of an ongoing technological progress establishes objective preconditions for such an eventual development.

We believe that the provided earlier line of argumentation, in defense of a suggestion that the concept of race is not merely a social construct, is being fully consistent with this paper’s initial thesis. Even though that, as time goes on, people’s understanding of race does undergo a qualitative transformation, their commitment to researching this subject matter could never cease being thoroughly legitimate.

This is because the specifics of one’s racial affiliation do define the concerned individual’s behavioral patterns – regardless of whether the hawks of political correctness want to admit it or not. In its turn, this explains why in today’s America, even the most progressive Caucasians, who take pride in their adherence to the ideals of multiculturalism, clearly prefer residing in a racially secluded ‘white suburbia’.

Apparently, these people’s deep-seated racism has nothing to do with the existence of social preconditions, which would prompt them to refrain from socializing with ‘colors’, but solely with the fact that they are being ‘programmed’ to act as subtle racists by the very specifics of their genetic makeup – pure and simple.

Therefore, it will only be logical, on our part, to conclude this paper by reinstating once again that there is nothing ‘unscientific’ about the concept of race and that this concept will continue to remain discursively relevant in the future.

Bibliography

Arnesen, Eric. “Whiteness and the Historians’ Imagination.” International Labor and Working-Class History 60.3 (2001): 3-32.

Baum, Bruce. Rise and Fall of the Caucasian Race: A Political History of Racial Identity. New York: NYU Press, 2006.

Bronwen, Walter. Outsiders Inside: Whiteness, Place and Irish Women. New York: Taylor & Francis Group, 2001.

Fredrickson, George. White Supremacy: A Comparative Study in American and South African History. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1981.

Grant, Madison. The Passing of the Great Race, or the Racial Basis of European History. New York: C. Scribner’s, 1918.

Greenwood, Susan. Anthropology of Magic. Oxford: Berg Publishers, 2009.

Lynn, Richard & Vanhanen, Tatu. IQ and the Wealth of Nations. Westport: Greenwood Publishing Group, 2002.

Petty, William. The Collected Works of Sir William Petty. London: Routledge/Thoemmes Press, (1667)1997.

Rindermann, Heiner., Woodley, Michael & Stratford, James. “Haplogroups as Evolutionary Markers of Cognitive Ability.” Intelligence 40.4 (2012): 362-375.

Sloan, Philip. “The Gaze of Natural History”, in Inventing Human Science: Eighteenth Century Domains, edited by Cristopher Fox, Roy Porter & Robert Wokler, 112-151, Berkeley: University of California Press,1995.

Spencer, Frank. “Bernier, Francois (1620—1688).” In History of Physical Anthropology: An Encyclopedia, vol. I., 161-175. New York: Garland Publishing, 1997.

Spencer, Frank. Ecce Homo: An Annotated Bibliographic History of Physical Anthropology. New York: Greenwood Press, 1986.

West, Cornel. “A Genealogy of Modern Racism.” In From Modernism to Postmodernism: An Anthology, edited by Lawrence Cahoone, 298-309, Boston: Wiley-Blackwell, 2003.

Footnotes

1. Eric Arnesen. “Whiteness and the Historians’ Imagination.” International Labor and Working-Class History 60.3 (2001): 6.
2. Bruce Baum. Rise and Fall of the Caucasian race: A Political History of Racial Identity (New York: NYU Press, 2006): 36.
3. Susan Greenwood, Anthropology of Magic (Oxford: Berg Publishers, 2009), 53.
4. George Fredrickson. White Supremacy: A Comparative Study in American and South African History (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1981), 70.
5. William Petty. The Collected Works of Sir William Petty (London: Routledge/Thoemmes Press, (1667)1997), 23.
6. Frank Spencer. “Bernier, Francois (1620—1688).” In History of Physical Anthropology: An Encyclopedia, vol. I,161-175, (New York: Garland Publishing, 1997), 169.
7. Philip Sloan. “The Gaze of Natural History”, in Inventing Human Science: Eighteenth Century Domains, edited by Cristopher Fox, Roy Porter & Robert Wokler, 112-151, (Berkeley: University of California Press,1995), 126.
8. Cornel West. “A Genealogy of Modern Racism.” In From Modernism to Postmodernism: An Anthology, edited by Lawrence Cahoone, 298-309 (Boston: Wiley-Blackwell, 2003), 306.
9. Walter Bronwen. Outsiders Inside: Whiteness, Place and Irish Women (New York: Taylor & Francis Group, 2001), 22.
10. Frank Spencer. Ecce Homo: An Annotated Bibliographic History of Physical Anthropology (New York: Greenwood Press, 1986), 178.
11. Madison Grant. The Passing of the Great Race, or the Racial Basis of European History (New York: C. Scribner’s, 1918), 226.
12. Richard Lynn & Tatu Vanhanen. IQ and the Wealth of Nations (Westport: Greenwood Publishing Group, 2002), 34.
13. Heiner Rindermann, Michael Woodley & James, Stratford. “Haplogroups as Evolutionary Markers of Cognitive Ability.” Intelligence 40.4 (2012): 368.