4 ms·

Most people in your room? In reality you know race by persons face. Is face a social construct?

by samat 8y ago

jacobwilliamroy 8y ago
As far as I can tell, race has no taxonomic significance when applied to modern humans, because all modern humans are the same species. The system for grouping people together by facial features seems to be a social construct most of the time. I can think of a partial exception to this rule: facial features which can be linked to diseases and injuries (for example, the tell-tale evidence of stroke make it possible to know stroke-victimness by face). I call that a partial exception, because there are groups of face-affecting conditions which look similar. What do we mean when we talk about human races anyway? I've been thinking about this for a few minutes now and I am stumped.
- cies 8y ago
  I feel that the new "PC" word for race is ethnicity. As I understand it serves pretty much the same purpose.
  - watwut 8y ago
    Ethnicity is defined primary through shared history and social grouping. Race is defined through genetics. They share some of the same, but are not the same.
    - cies 8y ago
      > Ethnicity is defined primary through shared history and social grouping. Agreed. But I feel ethnicity is "used" in a way like "race". > Race is defined through genetics. Sure? I thought genetically race had a very weak basis, and that it was basically some aspects of bodily looks and location of genetical/blood origination? The main reason we needed ethnicity as a term, because race was "simply not there in the genes" and thus "mostly about looks" which gave it very little use in proper science.
      - watwut 8y ago
        I don't think I agree with second. Germans have clearly different culture, language, habits, preferences, values and humor then Czechs. Wo ha different all above from French. A lot of it remains when group emirates but keeps being close knit. That is ethicity.
- asianthrowaway 8y ago
  All dog breeds are part of the same species, and dog breeds are fundamentally a social construct. Does this mean that we need to stop categorizing dogs into breeds? I find it hard to understand how some people still cling to 1960s "there is no such thing as race" arguments while in the real world you can send a swab of spit to 23andme or similar services and get a precise breakdown of your ethnic background down to the percentage.
  - aluren 8y ago
    "Race" is just how you look to other people and how that ties to your status. Its categorization is very much country dependent - Hispanic people are often not considered white in America, while no one would be making that distinction in Europe. On the contrary, Europeans often don't consider Arabs white, even though they often look white. The US and Europe have things like 'white', 'black', 'asian' but Latin Americans are much more nuanced. There are people that would be considered 'white' in Brazil and 'black' in the US. There are also things like passing [1] and so forth. All I'm saying is, this has nothing to do with the results of a 23andme sequencing run, which would provide details about your ancestry. Race (in the US sense) correlates pretty weakly with ancestry, e.g. all the early humans for most of human history were black. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Passing_(racial_identity) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Passing_(racial_identity)
    - asianthrowaway 8y ago
      > Its categorization is very much country dependent - Hispanic people are often not considered white in America Hispanic is not a race. Latin american history is complex and a lot of mixing happened. You do have hispanics who are predominantly european and are considered white in the USA, and they're appropriately called "white hispanics". > while no one would be making that distinction in Europe. Where do you get that from? I'm pretty sure a guy looking like Hugo Chavez would stand out in Sweden. > On the contrary, Europeans often don't consider Arabs white, even though they often look white. Same thing, what's an arab? The term arab is applied to people as distinct as yemenites, moroccans and syrian alawites. It's not a racial category. It's true that levantines can look white (Bashar al Assad for instance). > The US and Europe have things like 'white', 'black', 'asian' but Latin Americans are much more nuanced. There are people that would be considered 'white' in Brazil and 'black' in the US. There are also things like passing [1] and so forth. You're cherry picking. It's true that mixed race individuals (like a lot of Brazilians) are hard to classify, because they're precisely mixed! Same thing with other "border populations" like Turks. I'd like to see a full blooded Nigerian attempt to "pass" as Japanese in Japan. You know very well that is a ridiculous idea. > All I'm saying is, this has nothing to do with the results of a 23andme sequencing run, which would provide details about your ancestry. Ancestry and race are the exact same thing, since racial characteristics are passed down genetically. You're just playing semantics. > Race (in the US sense) correlates pretty weakly with ancestry It actually correlates really well. For instance, having all of your ancestors moving from Europe a hundred years ago correlates pretty well with you ending up white (and not a pygmy or australian aboriginal). > Race (in the US sense) correlates pretty weakly with ancestry, e.g. all the early humans for most of human history were black. I don't even know what to say to that. I guess we're all unicellular organisms too, if you go even further back...
Delfino 8y ago
As some of "mixed race" these conversations always get weird. Defining a person's race seems mostly exclusionary in my experience. By that I mean, when I'm around a group of people who identify as one of my races, they think I look like a member of the other group (noticing the differences more prominently than the similarities) so either way I'm defined as an other. My family is pretty heterogenous and in a few generations I see it being hard to peg specific individuals as a particular race.
krapp 8y ago
>Is face a social construct? Skin color, facial structure and other commonly held visual traits of "race" don't map strongly to genetic identifiers that could form some scientifically valid definition of "race." Two black people living in the same area, sharing the same cultural and ethnic identity, can differ more genetically than either with a white immigrant. In other words, that "black" is a race, and "white" is a race, etc, is entirely a social construct, which should be non-controversial given that these categories were created and solidified, culturally and politically, long before genetic science was even a thing.
- asianthrowaway 8y ago
  > Two black people living in the same area, sharing the same cultural and ethnic identity, can differ more genetically than either with a white immigrant. I'm pretty sure that's false. What is true is that africans exhibit a great amount of genetic diversity, i.e. two africans will typically be more genetically different than two europeans. But the genetic distance between either of those two africans and either of those two europeans will still be even greater. > In other words, that "black" is a race, and "white" is a race, etc, is entirely a social construct, which should be non-controversial given that these categories were created and solidified, culturally and politically, long before genetic science was even a thing. It's a social construct to the same extent as colors are a social construct, which were formulated long before the theories of electromagnetism was even a thing. A thing being a social construct doesn't mean it doesn't describe an underlying reality. That applies to any category invented by mankind. For instance, considering plants and animals, or even living beings and inanimate objects, as belonging to different categories is also a social construct. Because, after all, they're all just an association of atoms.
  - krapp 8y ago
    >I'm pretty sure that's false. What is true is that africans exhibit a great amount of genetic diversity, i.e. two africans will typically be more genetically different than two europeans. But the genetic distance between either of those two africans and either of those two europeans will still be even greater. I didn't say Africans and Europeans, I said black people and white people. A black person from Africa and a black person from elsewhere are considered the same race because of their visual similarities, regardless of their background. That's the social construct. >A thing being a social construct doesn't mean it doesn't describe an underlying reality It can be inaccurate enough that it isn't useful, though.

Most people in your room? In reality you know race by persons face. Is face a social construct?

by samat 8y ago

Most people in your room? In reality you know race by persons face. Is face a social construct?

As far as I can tell, race has no taxonomic significance when applied to modern humans, because all modern humans are the same species. The system for grouping people together by facial features seems to be a social construct most of the time. I can think of a partial exception to this rule: facial features which can be linked to diseases and injuries (for example, the tell-tale evidence of stroke make it possible to know stroke-victimness by face). I call that a partial exception, because there are groups of face-affecting conditions which look similar. What do we mean when we talk about human races anyway? I've been thinking about this for a few minutes now and I am stumped.

cies 8y ago
I feel that the new "PC" word for race is ethnicity. As I understand it serves pretty much the same purpose.
- watwut 8y ago
  Ethnicity is defined primary through shared history and social grouping. Race is defined through genetics. They share some of the same, but are not the same.
  - cies 8y ago
    > Ethnicity is defined primary through shared history and social grouping. Agreed. But I feel ethnicity is "used" in a way like "race". > Race is defined through genetics. Sure? I thought genetically race had a very weak basis, and that it was basically some aspects of bodily looks and location of genetical/blood origination? The main reason we needed ethnicity as a term, because race was "simply not there in the genes" and thus "mostly about looks" which gave it very little use in proper science.
    - watwut 8y ago
      I don't think I agree with second. Germans have clearly different culture, language, habits, preferences, values and humor then Czechs. Wo ha different all above from French. A lot of it remains when group emirates but keeps being close knit. That is ethicity.
asianthrowaway 8y ago
All dog breeds are part of the same species, and dog breeds are fundamentally a social construct. Does this mean that we need to stop categorizing dogs into breeds? I find it hard to understand how some people still cling to 1960s "there is no such thing as race" arguments while in the real world you can send a swab of spit to 23andme or similar services and get a precise breakdown of your ethnic background down to the percentage.
- aluren 8y ago
  "Race" is just how you look to other people and how that ties to your status. Its categorization is very much country dependent - Hispanic people are often not considered white in America, while no one would be making that distinction in Europe. On the contrary, Europeans often don't consider Arabs white, even though they often look white. The US and Europe have things like 'white', 'black', 'asian' but Latin Americans are much more nuanced. There are people that would be considered 'white' in Brazil and 'black' in the US. There are also things like passing [1] and so forth. All I'm saying is, this has nothing to do with the results of a 23andme sequencing run, which would provide details about your ancestry. Race (in the US sense) correlates pretty weakly with ancestry, e.g. all the early humans for most of human history were black. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Passing_(racial_identity) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Passing_(racial_identity)
  - asianthrowaway 8y ago
    > Its categorization is very much country dependent - Hispanic people are often not considered white in America Hispanic is not a race. Latin american history is complex and a lot of mixing happened. You do have hispanics who are predominantly european and are considered white in the USA, and they're appropriately called "white hispanics". > while no one would be making that distinction in Europe. Where do you get that from? I'm pretty sure a guy looking like Hugo Chavez would stand out in Sweden. > On the contrary, Europeans often don't consider Arabs white, even though they often look white. Same thing, what's an arab? The term arab is applied to people as distinct as yemenites, moroccans and syrian alawites. It's not a racial category. It's true that levantines can look white (Bashar al Assad for instance). > The US and Europe have things like 'white', 'black', 'asian' but Latin Americans are much more nuanced. There are people that would be considered 'white' in Brazil and 'black' in the US. There are also things like passing [1] and so forth. You're cherry picking. It's true that mixed race individuals (like a lot of Brazilians) are hard to classify, because they're precisely mixed! Same thing with other "border populations" like Turks. I'd like to see a full blooded Nigerian attempt to "pass" as Japanese in Japan. You know very well that is a ridiculous idea. > All I'm saying is, this has nothing to do with the results of a 23andme sequencing run, which would provide details about your ancestry. Ancestry and race are the exact same thing, since racial characteristics are passed down genetically. You're just playing semantics. > Race (in the US sense) correlates pretty weakly with ancestry It actually correlates really well. For instance, having all of your ancestors moving from Europe a hundred years ago correlates pretty well with you ending up white (and not a pygmy or australian aboriginal). > Race (in the US sense) correlates pretty weakly with ancestry, e.g. all the early humans for most of human history were black. I don't even know what to say to that. I guess we're all unicellular organisms too, if you go even further back...

Delfino 8y ago

As some of "mixed race" these conversations always get weird. Defining a person's race seems mostly exclusionary in my experience. By that I mean, when I'm around a group of people who identify as one of my races, they think I look like a member of the other group (noticing the differences more prominently than the similarities) so either way I'm defined as an other. My family is pretty heterogenous and in a few generations I see it being hard to peg specific individuals as a particular race.

krapp 8y ago

>Is face a social construct? Skin color, facial structure and other commonly held visual traits of "race" don't map strongly to genetic identifiers that could form some scientifically valid definition of "race." Two black people living in the same area, sharing the same cultural and ethnic identity, can differ more genetically than either with a white immigrant. In other words, that "black" is a race, and "white" is a race, etc, is entirely a social construct, which should be non-controversial given that these categories were created and solidified, culturally and politically, long before genetic science was even a thing.

asianthrowaway 8y ago
> Two black people living in the same area, sharing the same cultural and ethnic identity, can differ more genetically than either with a white immigrant. I'm pretty sure that's false. What is true is that africans exhibit a great amount of genetic diversity, i.e. two africans will typically be more genetically different than two europeans. But the genetic distance between either of those two africans and either of those two europeans will still be even greater. > In other words, that "black" is a race, and "white" is a race, etc, is entirely a social construct, which should be non-controversial given that these categories were created and solidified, culturally and politically, long before genetic science was even a thing. It's a social construct to the same extent as colors are a social construct, which were formulated long before the theories of electromagnetism was even a thing. A thing being a social construct doesn't mean it doesn't describe an underlying reality. That applies to any category invented by mankind. For instance, considering plants and animals, or even living beings and inanimate objects, as belonging to different categories is also a social construct. Because, after all, they're all just an association of atoms.
- krapp 8y ago
  >I'm pretty sure that's false. What is true is that africans exhibit a great amount of genetic diversity, i.e. two africans will typically be more genetically different than two europeans. But the genetic distance between either of those two africans and either of those two europeans will still be even greater. I didn't say Africans and Europeans, I said black people and white people. A black person from Africa and a black person from elsewhere are considered the same race because of their visual similarities, regardless of their background. That's the social construct. >A thing being a social construct doesn't mean it doesn't describe an underlying reality It can be inaccurate enough that it isn't useful, though.