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ON THE NONEXISTENCE OF HUMAN RACES Frank B. Livingstone In the last decade there has been a remarkable increase in our knowledge of the complexities of human genetic variability. To an increasing number of anthropologists the concept of race seems to be losing its usefulness in describing this variability. In fact, for the human populations among which some of us have worked, it seems impossible even to divide these populations into races. At the same time a growing minority of biologists in general are advocating a similar position with regard to the usefulness of the concept of subspecies for classifying such diverse organisms as grackles, martens, and butterflies (Brown, 1957; Hagmeier, 1958; Gillham, 1956). Although there appears to have been a minimum of communication between anthropologists and biologists on this common problem, many of the arguments of the two groups are quite similar. It should be pointed out that the two similar positions on subspecific variation do not imply that there is no biological or genetic variability among the populations of organisms which comprise a species, but simply that this variability does not conform to the discrete packages labelled races or subspecies. For man the position can be stated in other words: There are no races, there are only clines.1 The term race has had a long history of anthropological usage and it can be generally defined as referring to a group of local or breeding populations within a species. Thus, it is a taxonomic term for subspecific groupings greater than the local population. Most anthropologists today use a genetic definition of races as populations which differ in the frequency of some genes. The term race, or its newer synonym, geographical race, is used in a similar way with reference to biological species other than man. Where the term is used, it can be considered as approximately synonymous with the term subspecies. In 1953 Wilson and Brown first suggested discarding the concept of subspecies since it did not accord with the facts. Their main argument was that the genetic variation among the local populations of a species was discordant. Variation is concordant if the geographic variation of the genetic characters is l[A cline is a continuous gradation over space in the form or frequency of a trait. Thus elinal variation is continuous, not abrupt.-Ed.] 134 / Science Constructs "Race" correlated, so that a classification based on one character would reflect the variability in any other. Such a pattern of variation is almost never found among the local populations of a wide-ranging species, although it is usually found among related relatively allopatric species.2 Thus, although it is possible to divide a group of related species into discrete units, namely the species, it is impossible to divide a single species into groups larger than the panmictic3 population. The causes of intraspecific biological variation are different from those of interspecific variation and to apply the term subspecies to any part of such variation is not only arbitrary or impossible but tends to obscure the explanation of this variation.4 If one genetic character is used, it is possible to divide a species into subspecies according to the variation in this charaClter. If two characters are used, it may still be possible, but there will be some "problem populations," which, if you are an anthropologist, will be labelled cOlnposite or mixed. As the number of characters increases it becomes more nearly impossible to determine what the "actual races really are." In addition to being a concept used to classify human variability, race has also been oveNTorked as an explanation of this variability. When a particular blood group gene: or hair form is found to be characteristic of the populations of a particular region, it is frequently "explained" as being a "racial" character. This type of explanation means, in other words, that this particular set of human populations possesses this character, while it is absent in the rest of humanity, because of the close common ancestry of the former. At times many characteristics which were thought to be racial have been found in many widely separated populations, so that the explanation in terms of race required the assumption of lengthy migrations. In this way race or common ancestry and migration have been used to explain much of the genetic variability among human populations. Unfortunately such explanations neither accord with our knowledge of the population structure and movements of hunters and gatherers, nor take into consideration the basic cause of biological variation...

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