Transracial?

[Jason Harvestdancer]

So don't call it race. Mother Nature likes to create semi-hemi-demi-species and telling us that our neat Linnaean classification system has fuck-all to do with the real world.

Still, if you are trying to get clues after a crime, and there is blood spattered on the wall, that blood can be DNA tested to tell us a few things about whomever that blood belongs to. Not just sex, but also what part of the world that person's ancestors came from. So don't call it race, that doesn't eliminate what little genetic diversity the human species does have.

 

[Politesse]

So don't call it race. Mother Nature likes to create semi-hemi-demi-species and telling us that our neat Linnaean classification system has fuck-all to do with the real world.

Still, if you are trying to get clues after a crime, and there is blood spattered on the wall, that blood can be DNA tested to tell us a few things about whomever that blood belongs to. Not just sex, but also what part of the world that person's ancestors came from. So don't call it race, that doesn't eliminate what little genetic diversity the human species does have.

The problem with "race" is that it obscures, rather than clarifies, biological descent. We have known how reproduction works scientifically since the 1930's, and folk classifications of "race" have been scientifically meaningless ever since.

Your forensic scientist is not, in fact, useful if all they can give you is a "race"; the vast majority of people have a much more complicated genetic pattern than belonging exclusively to one apparent race would suggest. Real genetic science is both more precise, and more ready to account for phenotypic variability. Your blood does not, in fact, tell you "what part of the world" you came from, but rather what reproductive networks your ancestors belonged to, as a result of social and political patterns that may have originated in geographical proximity at some point, but were in all likelihood quite complicated in the last few (and therefore most important to creating positive id) generations.

Is it more useful to know that someone "looks black", or that they are one of only a couple dozen people in town, all related to one another, with lineage tying them to a particular village in Ghana, regardless of what their expressed skin color happens to be? The whole idiotic notion of race gets in the way of correct descriptions of inheritance, and new forensic anthropologists usually have to be trained out of making race-based assumptions before they become useful lab techs.

This doesn't make race unimportant. As a social and political reality, it is both empirically real and important for a social scientist to understand. It just doesn't have anything to do with biological science.

 

[Bomb#20]

There's no such thing as a biological race; human biological differences present as clines, not natural categories. Race profiles begin their life as political entities...

Your claim that there is no such thing as a biological race is mistaken. ... It's not a matter I'm going to debate, though: that has been done to death in this forum...

While I was not present for these discussions, I do not find them difficult to imagine. ... I assure you that popular perversions of misunderstood haplogroup data do not stand up against the real science of human biological and social diversity.

Ah, imagined counterarguments. The kind that's easiest to refute, and best suited for knocking down in Political Discussions.

I am an anthropologist; this is my field.

Argument from authority? Seriously? As you wish...

'There is a widespread feeling that the word race indicates something undesirable and that it should be left out of all discussions. This leads to such statements as "there are no human races." Those who subscribe to this opinion are obviously ignorant of modern biology.'

- Ernst Mayr​

 

[Politesse]

While I was not present for these discussions, I do not find them difficult to imagine. ... I assure you that popular perversions of misunderstood haplogroup data do not stand up against the real science of human biological and social diversity.

Ah, imagined counterarguments. The kind that's easiest to refute, and best suited for knocking down in Political Discussions.

I am an anthropologist; this is my field.

Argument from authority? Seriously? As you wish...

'There is a widespread feeling that the word race indicates something undesirable and that it should be left out of all discussions. This leads to such statements as "there are no human races." Those who subscribe to this opinion are obviously ignorant of modern biology.'

- Ernst Mayr​

I apologize for the apparent impression that I was making an argument from authority. I was not intending to suggest that you ought to believe me simply because of my credentials. There have, after all, been a fair number of racist anthropologists over the years, to say nothing of racist ornithologists. However, I was pointing out that dealing with this question was a common feature of my career, and that as such I was already familiar with the relevant data set; there is no need to advice me to "research" the issue by reading forum posts from several years ago. Nor a contextless quote from an non-specialist. I am familiar with Mayr's Daedalus editorial, and the philosophical context of his views for that matter. But as he never advanced a serious, falsifiable scientific argument for the existence of his "geographic races", let alone his political support for positive eugenics, I am not clear on why his views would be relevant to a discussion of the scientific validity of race? I have not claimed that race does not exist as a social and political reality, it obviously does.

 

[Angra Mainyu]

I apologize for the apparent impression that I was making an argument from authority. I was not intending to suggest that you ought to believe me simply because of my credentials.

You did not say that to Bomb#20 or to me, but but your denial that there is such thing as a biological race was an objection to one of my points, and you did not add any evidence other than authority to support that. That is a little bit of evidence, but very little. Overall, the evidence I've seen remains decisively against your claim, so I should not be persuaded by it - and I'm not.

However, I was pointing out that dealing with this question was a common feature of my career, and that as such I was already familiar with the relevant data set; there is no need to advice me to "research" the issue by reading forum posts from several years ago.

If you were familiar, you would not deny the existence of biological race, unless you're making an epistemic error - i.e., you are mistakenly assessing the data set. But I do not know that you are making an epistemic error. Maybe you are familiar with the information about biology, but not with the information about the meaning of the words, so your mistake is semantic. What do I know? I would have to see your arguments to tell. Other than that, I reckon that you're mistaken on the basis of the available evidence, but I don't know exactly where you go wrong.

 

[Politesse]

I apologize for the apparent impression that I was making an argument from authority. I was not intending to suggest that you ought to believe me simply because of my credentials.

You did not say that to Bomb#20 or to me, but but your denial that there is such thing as a biological race was an objection to one of my points, and you did not add any evidence other than authority to support that. That is a little bit of evidence, but very little. Overall, the evidence I've seen remains decisively against your claim, so I should not be persuaded by it - and I'm not.

However, I was pointing out that dealing with this question was a common feature of my career, and that as such I was already familiar with the relevant data set; there is no need to advice me to "research" the issue by reading forum posts from several years ago.

If you were familiar, you would not deny the existence of biological race, unless you're making an epistemic error - i.e., you are mistakenly assessing the data set. But I do not know that you are making an epistemic error. Maybe you are familiar with the information about biology, but not with the information about the meaning of the words, so your mistake is semantic. What do I know? I would have to see your arguments to tell. Other than that, I reckon that you're mistaken on the basis of the available evidence, but I don't know exactly where you go wrong.

What argument? I cannot disprove an unfalsifiable claim, but if there is no evidence for it in the first place, we aren't talking science. We know a lot about inheritance, more than can easily be summarized in a forum post. But race is not used as a functional category, nor has it been discovered as a natural property of any sort.

 

[Angra Mainyu]

What argument?

Whatever argument you may have in support of your claim that there is no such thing as a biological race.

I cannot disprove an unfalsifiable claim, but if there is no evidence for it in the first place, we aren't talking science.

But you claimed that there is no such thing as a biological race. Was your claim unfalsifiable? If it was not, then I don't see why there could be no evidence for it. Yet, I have not seen it. I have seen many people claim that there is no such thing as a biological race, whereas other people reply that there is, and vice versa (i.e., people claim that there is, and others deny that). I have read the arguments of both sides - plenty of them, anyway -, the information they presented in support of their respective claims, etc., and on the basis of that, I reckon that there is such thing as a biological race. Given that you told me there is not, I was asking for any arguments in support of your claim. As for my implication (and now claim) that there are biological races, as I said, I wasn't going to participate in a debate on race here, as people who know a lot more about it than I do have already provided decisive arguments, so posting the links is good enough.

Of course, you may not want to read those arguments, and you will not be persuaded if you don't (if you did read them, I can't tell for sure, but previous experience indicate people who claim that there are no races are at least almost never persuaded that there are, so it would be very difficult). But then, I see no good reason to be persuaded by your telling me that there is no biological race, either. I do take your word on it as another piece of evidence, but it does not move the needle significantly - no offense, but the arguments I've seen seem pretty unassailable, so I would need a lot more than an argument from authority to counter them.

We know a lot about inheritance, more than can easily be summarized in a forum post.

This is of course true, but I'm not sure how it would be relevant.

But race is not used as a functional category, nor has it been discovered as a natural property of any sort.

I'm not sure whether I understand how you use the terms here. Is species a functional category, or a natural property? Subspecies? Variety?
Regardless, there are human races, and those are biological distinctions. I provided the relevant links already, and as I said I will not give an argument myself given that better arguments have already been given, so I will leave it at that.

 

[Toni]

Whatever argument you may have in support of your claim that there is no such thing as a biological race.


But you claimed that there is no such thing as a biological race. Was your claim unfalsifiable? If it was not, then I don't see why there could be no evidence for it. Yet, I have not seen it. I have seen many people claim that there is no such thing as a biological race, whereas other people replying that there is. I have read the arguments of both sides, the information they presented in support of their respective claims, etc., and on the basis of that, I reckon that there is such thing as a biological race. Given that you told me there is not, I was asking for any arguments in support of your claim. As for my implication (and now claim) that there are biological races, as I said, I wasn't going to participate in a debate on race here, as people who know a lot more about it than I do have already provided decisive arguments, so posting the links is good enough.

Of course, you may not want to read those arguments, and you will not be persuaded if you don't (if you did read them, I can't tell for sure, but previous experience indicate people who claim that there are no races are at least almost never persuaded that there are, so it would be very difficult). But then, I see no good reason to be persuaded by your telling me that there is no biological race, either. I do take your word on it as another piece of evidence, but it does not move the needle significantly - no offense, but the arguments I've seen seem pretty unassailable, so I would need a lot more than an argument from authority to counter them.

We know a lot about inheritance, more than can easily be summarized in a forum post.

This is of course true, but I'm not sure how it would be relevant.

But race is not used as a functional category, nor has it been discovered as a natural property of any sort.

I'm not sure whether I understand how you use the terms here.
I don't know what you mean by those terms. Is species a functional category, or a natural property? Subspecies? Variety?
Regardless, there are human races, and those are biological distinctions. I provided the relevant links already, and as I said I will not give an argument myself given that better arguments have already been given, so I will leave it at that.

I'm pretty sure that you can just leave off at: "I don't know..."

 

[skepticalbip]

Didn't occur to me that Snopes would cover that. So it is true then. She did claim it. I don't need specific evidence that she gained her position at Harvard law through it. The fact that she claimed it at all is reason enough for me to conclude she was dishonest about it, and I thin it reasonable for the default explanation of that to be that she did it for some sort of personal gain she thought she may get out of it. Unless she has some alternate explanation? She was doing it as a joke? She was doing it as some sort of social experiment for the students? Nothing plausible comes to mind.

But the question of this thread isn't that. My question is whether there is anything wrong with her doing it. In a society seeing things more and more by group identity, with assumed upsides and downsides, and benefits and costs for each identity, but also allowing people to identify how they want (trans movement - or is that only for gender?), I see a conflict.

She also wrote a cook book "Pow Wow Chow" by Elizabeth Warren - Cherokee
It is available on Amazon if you would like a copy.

I don't know if she made any money on it or, if she did, whether or not she gave the funds to charity.
But it was published and credited as written by "Elizabeth Warren - Cherokee"


ETA:
Damn. I read the OP and a couple posts down and didn't think to look to see how long the thread was. I'm sorry if this has already been mentioned somewhere in the preceding hundred or so posts.

 

[Arctish]

Didn't occur to me that Snopes would cover that. So it is true then. She did claim it. I don't need specific evidence that she gained her position at Harvard law through it. The fact that she claimed it at all is reason enough for me to conclude she was dishonest about it, and I thin it reasonable for the default explanation of that to be that she did it for some sort of personal gain she thought she may get out of it. Unless she has some alternate explanation? She was doing it as a joke? She was doing it as some sort of social experiment for the students? Nothing plausible comes to mind.

But the question of this thread isn't that. My question is whether there is anything wrong with her doing it. In a society seeing things more and more by group identity, with assumed upsides and downsides, and benefits and costs for each identity, but also allowing people to identify how they want (trans movement - or is that only for gender?), I see a conflict.

She also wrote a cook book "Pow Wow Chow" by Elizabeth Warren - Cherokee
It is available on Amazon if you would like a copy.

I don't know if she made any money on it or, if she did, whether or not she gave the funds to charity.
But it was published and credited as written by "Elizabeth Warren - Cherokee"


ETA:
Damn. I read the OP and a couple posts down and didn't think to look to see how long the thread was. I'm sorry if this has already been mentioned somewhere in the preceding hundred or so posts.

Pow Wow Chow: A Collection of Recipes from Families of the Five Civilized Tribes : Cherokee, Chickasaw, Choctaw, Creek and Seminole

How much Cherokee and Delaware ancestry does Warren's family need to have before they're allowed to claim Native American ancestry?

Is it strictly a matter of DNA or do family traditions and cultural patrimony count?

 

[skepticalbip]

... snip...

How much Cherokee and Delaware ancestry does Warren's family need to have before they're allowed to claim Native American ancestry?

I don't what the Delaware require for someone to claim to be tribal. But the requirements for Cherokee Nation Tribal membership is pretty steep. There must documents that link the applicant by blood to a specifically named ancestor that is on the official tribal roles. I understand that the Cherokee contacted her and told her to stop calling herself Cherokee.

 

[Toni]

... snip...

How much Cherokee and Delaware ancestry does Warren's family need to have before they're allowed to claim Native American ancestry?

I don't what the Delaware require for someone to claim to be tribal. But the requirements for Cherokee Nation Tribal membership is pretty steep. There must documents that link the applicant by blood to a specifically named ancestor that is on the official tribal roles. I understand that the Cherokee contacted her and told her to stop calling herself Cherokee.

Claiming Native American ancestry is not at all the same thing as being a tribal member.

Native Americans legitimately have the right to determine tribal membership and correctly point out the limitations of current DNA test databases and their uses and misuses. This is quite different than your spin:

https://www.foxnews.com/politics/ch...-test-useless-to-determine-tribal-citizenship

 

[Trausti]

... snip...

How much Cherokee and Delaware ancestry does Warren's family need to have before they're allowed to claim Native American ancestry?

I don't what the Delaware require for someone to claim to be tribal. But the requirements for Cherokee Nation Tribal membership is pretty steep. There must documents that link the applicant by blood to a specifically named ancestor that is on the official tribal roles. I understand that the Cherokee contacted her and told her to stop calling herself Cherokee.

Claiming Native American ancestry is not at all the same thing as being a tribal member.

Yeah, anyone can claim it.

 

[Toni]

Claiming Native American ancestry is not at all the same thing as being a tribal member.

Yeah, anyone can claim it.

And anyone can claim anything on the internet. Warren never misrepresented her heritage. A lot of bigots have, though.

 

[skepticalbip]

Claiming Native American ancestry is not at all the same thing as being a tribal member.

Yeah, anyone can claim it.

I think that claiming native American ancestry was a thing in the late 1800s or early 1900s and the stories filtered on down until today. My grandmother told us we were part Indian through her grandmother and my grandmother had lots of stories she heard from grandmother about Indian life. My little brother still swears that we are part Cherokee. I enjoyed the stories but I think we are mostly Irish, Scottish, English, and it would be neat throw in something a little exotic but I don't think it's there.

 

[Arctish]

Claiming Native American ancestry is not at all the same thing as being a tribal member.

Yeah, anyone can claim it.

I think that claiming native American ancestry was a thing in the late 1800s or early 1900s and the stories filtered on down until today. My grandmother told us we were part Indian through her grandmother and my grandmother had lots of stories she heard from grandmother about Indian life. My little brother still swears that we are part Cherokee.

There are a lot of folks where I live who have both European and Native Alaskan ancestry. Assuming their descendants marry mostly whites, at what point will their family members lose the right to say they have Native Alaskan ancestry?

Can someone whose great-great-grandfather was a Tlingit but isn't formally listed as a member of any of the Tlingit clans still say "I have an ancestor who was Tlingit", or would that be a 'transracial' transgression?

 

[Trausti]

I think that claiming native American ancestry was a thing in the late 1800s or early 1900s and the stories filtered on down until today. My grandmother told us we were part Indian through her grandmother and my grandmother had lots of stories she heard from grandmother about Indian life. My little brother still swears that we are part Cherokee.

There are a lot of folks where I live who have both European and Native Alaskan ancestry. Assuming their descendants marry mostly whites, at what point will their family members lose the right to say they have Native Alaskan ancestry?

Can someone whose great-great-grandfather was a Tlingit but isn't formally listed as a member of any of the Tlingit clans still say "I have an ancestor who was Tlingit", or would that be a 'transracial' transgression?

No, but it would be silly. This is all so silly. By your example, this person has one great-great grand parent who was Tlingit? What about all the others? That far back there are 16 great-great-grand parents. And you focus on just that one; the one great-great grand parent that you think makes you special? Good grief. In Warren's case - what 8-10 generations back, maybe? - it gets exponentially dumber.

 

[Arctish]

I think that claiming native American ancestry was a thing in the late 1800s or early 1900s and the stories filtered on down until today. My grandmother told us we were part Indian through her grandmother and my grandmother had lots of stories she heard from grandmother about Indian life. My little brother still swears that we are part Cherokee.

There are a lot of folks where I live who have both European and Native Alaskan ancestry. Assuming their descendants marry mostly whites, at what point will their family members lose the right to say they have Native Alaskan ancestry?

Can someone whose great-great-grandfather was a Tlingit but isn't formally listed as a member of any of the Tlingit clans still say "I have an ancestor who was Tlingit", or would that be a 'transracial' transgression?

No, but it would be silly. This is all so silly. By your example, this person has one great-great grand parent who was Tlingit? What about all the others? That far back there are 16 great-great-grand parents. And you focus on just that one; the one that you think makes you special? Good grief. In Warren's case - what 8-10 generations back, maybe? - it gets exponentially dumber.

Maybe to you it's dumb. In Warren's family it was so important that her parents had to elope. That's not ancient history, and it's not trivial.

Anyway, the question is, at what point are people no longer allowed to say they have a Native American ancestor even if it's true? What's the cutoff?

ETA: I know a guy with an ancestor who came over on the Mayflower and is a distant relative of Daniel Boone. Is he not allowed to tell anyone about the family history because it was so far back?

What about Sally Hemings' descendants who fought for, and won, the right to be buried in the Jefferson family graveyard at Monticello? Too far back to matter to you? It mattered to them.

 

[Trausti]

No, but it would be silly. This is all so silly. By your example, this person has one great-great grand parent who was Tlingit? What about all the others? That far back there are 16 great-great-grand parents. And you focus on just that one; the one that you think makes you special? Good grief. In Warren's case - what 8-10 generations back, maybe? - it gets exponentially dumber.

Maybe to you it's dumb. In Warren's family it was so important that her parents had to elope. That's not ancient history, and it's not trivial.

Anyway, the question is, at what point are people no longer allowed to say they have a Native American ancestor even if it's true? What's the cutoff?

Holy shit, you believe that?

 

[Arctish]

No, but it would be silly. This is all so silly. By your example, this person has one great-great grand parent who was Tlingit? What about all the others? That far back there are 16 great-great-grand parents. And you focus on just that one; the one that you think makes you special? Good grief. In Warren's case - what 8-10 generations back, maybe? - it gets exponentially dumber.

Maybe to you it's dumb. In Warren's family it was so important that her parents had to elope. That's not ancient history, and it's not trivial.

Anyway, the question is, at what point are people no longer allowed to say they have a Native American ancestor even if it's true? What's the cutoff?

Holy shit, you believe that?

You read the first paragraph, right?

You also read the Boston Globe articles in which various family members told reporters the stories they'd been told about the family history, right?

So you know the reported reason the marriage of Donald Herring to Pauline Reed came as a surprise to many of their friends is because they eloped, and the reported reason they eloped is because his parents objected to their son marrying someone with NA ancestry, right?

I don't know if you saw my ETA in the previous post, so here it is again:

ETA: I know a guy with an ancestor who came over on the Mayflower and is a distant relative of Daniel Boone. Is he not allowed to tell anyone about the family history because it was so far back?

What about Sally Hemings' descendants who fought for, and won, the right to be buried in the Jefferson family graveyard at Monticello? Too far back to matter to you? It mattered to them.