Backintyme Essays

The imposition of an endogamous color line eventually led to the synthesis of a unique ethno-cultural community in the Jacksonian Northeast. Session C13 of a series of topics on the history of the U.S. color line discussed in lectures on “The Study of Racialism.”

“Absence of evidence is not evidence of absence.” Those words were spoken by a lawyer friend, who disputed my reluctant conclusion that claims by congressmen André Carson of Indiana, Emanuel Cleaver II of Missouri and John Lewis of Georgia of being verbally assaulted with ethnic slurs in front of the Capitol on March 20, 2010 are factually inaccurate.

Introduces a series on the history of the one-drop rule: how, when, where, and why this odd myth was invented. Session C14 of a series of contemporary issues topics in The Study of Racialism.

According to President Obama’s (now resigned) “green policy” advisor Van Jones, “Only suburban white kids shoot-up schools.”

Most of us realize that only so-called White folks have historically enjoyed the full privileges of U.S. citizenship. And most of us know that the definition of “White” has widened over the centuries. But grasping these points does not avoid all historical pitfalls.

Describes the many triracial communities that have lived scattered throughout the U.S. southeast since colonial times. Session E3 of a series of contemporary issues topics on “The Study of Racialism.”

Explains how the features that determine U.S. “racial” classification are inherited. Session C3 of a series of molecular anthropology topics.

Tells why northern Europeans are so oddly de-pigmented compared to everyone else on the globe. Session E1 of a series of topics on molecular anthropology included in my lectures on “The Study of Racialism.” The prior session, E5 discussed the migrations that carried our species around the globe in prehistoric times. This topic looks at later regional adaptations.

The one-drop rule is the U.S. tradition that someone of utterly European appearance who rejects an African-American self-identity is “really Black,” like it or not, due to having “one drop” of known African ancestry, no matter how ancient. The notion labels such people as merely “passing for White.” Recent examples are New York Times critic Anatole Broyard (a real person) and Anthony Hopkins’s character in the film “The Human Stain” (a fictional character). Such people are involuntarily classified as members of the U.S. Black endogamous group by press and public despite their European appearance and their freely chosen non-Black self-identity.

Molecular anthropologists are often asked if DNA markers can tell what “race” you are. The short answer is “no.” Mitochondrial DNA and Y haplogroups can tell from which continent your matrilineal and patrilineal ancestors came. And if you live in the Americas, autosomal mapping can tell what fraction of your ancestors came from Africa as slaves, what fraction came from Europe as colonists, and what fraction were Native Americans. But no DNA can tell your “race.”