“There is no necessary concordance between biological characteristics and culturally defined groups. On every continent, there are diverse populations that differ in language, economy, and culture. There is no national, religious, linguistic or cultural group or economic class that constitutes a race.”
In an attempt to try and explain the above statement. I would use an analogy and say that people are like chess pieces. While we all may look different and perform various tasks in different ways, we are all inherently the same. At the end of the day we are all just chess pieces doing our duties on the chessboard.
As a study of “us”, It is quite interesting to think about how despite our access to anthropological information and resources, we, as a whole race, still see others attempting to put themselves before others. It should be common sense that the more you look into something, the more details you learn about it. I think that mankind has the potential to possess mysteries at the the level outer space possesses. looking back and discovering ones ancestry on the individual level is something that can be quite shocking for a lot of people. There’s always a shock factor when you go back and look at your roots and I think that that’s a universal trait among all people.
In terms of anthropological studies, the fact that people have come to the conclusion found in the statement at the beginning isn’t that shocking. Especially after the past three weeks of material, seeing the relationship between biological studies and anthropological studies has made topics like this much more interesting and developed. Even if the the studies don’t hold much merit , or if they simply laid the groundwork for the collective understanding, I think that the relationship between biological theory and practical history is quite prevalent.
In regards to whether or not I found anything interesting or surprising, I can’t say that this week has utterly shocked me or piqued my interest all that much. I think that anyone that decides to really ponder and look into this topic will simply find a collective of information that they may have already kind of believed themselves. This isn’t to say that I found this weeks topics dull or boring, I enjoyed reading about the biological relations between us. However, on a similar note to what I said previously, I think that the conclusions displayed this week are simply affirmations that we can be better people. By displaying the information that we are all inherently the same, It serves as a good platform to help explain to people that we are not limited by the constructs put in place. The reading this week helps display how things like racism and culture wars are truly the highest forms of ignorance, and it is off of that note that I think we can see how anthropological studies will always be prevalent and useful to us as a society. As we learn about how a majority of our differences come from external factors, we can work to understand and possibly change some of those factors in order to better understand each other in general.
Good Job! I really enjoyed reading your posting! I liked the way you took a quote then backed it up with your own metaphor of the chess pieces. It is true. We have the same potential on the inside even if we look different on the outside. The visible differences between us do not make us any less than those next to us, it should just be a way to open our minds. I like that you were honest about the fact that even though none of this weeks material exactly interested you, you were still open to learn the information you did not know and add that to the knowledge you already had. People tend to not believe something unless there is physical proof behind the claim and the only kind of proof to the worlds unanswered questions is science. The meanings behind race and the need to add to it is because of the way society draws a line of difference between the way everyone looks. We learned that majority of people came from Africa but lets say those people did not have darker skin. Would they have lived long enough to reproduce and eventually migrating to different parts of the world? The true concept behind it is nothing but beautiful, even if it can be redundant at times. Everyone came from somewhere and every single one of us are just trying to survive. We cannot choose the environments we are brought into but we can control how we conform to those environments and better ourselves. Thanks again for sharing your views, it made me think about the topic in a different view.
I really enjoyed reading your posting! I liked the way you took a quote then backed it up with your own metaphor of the chess pieces. It is true. We have the same potential on the inside even if we look different on the outside. The visible differences between us do not make us any less than those next to us, it should just be a way to open our minds. I like that you were honest about the fact that even though none of this weeks material exactly interested you, you were still open to learn the information you did not know and add that to the knowledge you already had. People tend to not believe something unless there is physical proof behind the claim and the only kind of proof to the worlds unanswered questions is science. The meanings behind race and the need to add to it is because of the way society draws a line of difference between the way everyone looks. We learned that majority of people came from Africa but lets say those people did not have darker skin. Would they have lived long enough to reproduce and eventually migrating to different parts of the world? The true concept behind it is nothing but beautiful, even if it can be redundant at times. Everyone came from somewhere and every single one of us are just trying to survive. We cannot choose the environments we are brought into but we can control how we conform to those environments and better ourselves.