"Race Types" from 1906 book
Brian Herzog says:
I was going through my great grandmother's old school books, and found this "Race Types" plate in Maury's New Complete Geography, copyright 1906.LinkAlmost any viewpoint from the past will be interesting for the contrast to current thought, and race issues especially so. In this case, it's interesting who they chose to highlight as a race, ie, "Scotch Highlander."
Also, this books groups Anglo-Saxon, Arab, Hebrew, Russian, and others all as "Caucasian," and classifies American Negro as "Ethiopian."
Is 2008 better or worse than 1906?
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Strange lack of blond haired people or Scandinavians. I think this could be put in a modern textbook if it replaced race with culture.
And here I've been laboring under the impression that "raja" was a title, not a race.
I think that we're better in that we understand the categorization better. I'm not exactly sure what you mean by "better" though.
Re: #3
I'm pretty sure the Rajput was a distinct soldier caste and considered themselves a distinct ethnicity or perhaps sub-culture. If I'm understanding how the caste system worked from my admittedly Western view. Maybe more like a tribe. Since there wasn't much (or perhaps any) mixing of castes, I'm guessing during the time of the English Raj they were considered of a different ethnicity from the other castes by Westerners.
After looking at Oxford Dict (OS X version), it appears Raja is the title, and Rajput is the caste (from which the Rajas come).
"Is 2008 better or worse than 1906?" ... What? We're certainly better at not putting half-assed, confused, racist, sexist depictions/descriptions of "race types" into textbooks. Sure, it's still a somewhat murky and tense subject, but Herzog's rhetorical question is silly.
Mister Japanese appears to be an onnagata sans wig.
no females of any type in 1906?
my grandmother was around then...
But it doesn't say which one is best.
There's got to be a winner, right?
"sheik" is a title, too, no?
My grandparents-in-law have a children's textbook from the turn of the 20th century that's much worse. It breaks the peoples of the world into colors (white for European, yellow for east Asian, black for African, etc.) and compares their abilities. I believe it ranks them in terms of intelligence and ability to create civilized society.
I'll have to see if I can get a scan of it when I next visit them in April. Or at least transcribe some of the more outrageous text.
These look like they may be the source for the artwork on the cover of Duke Ellington's "Afro-Eurasian Eclipse."
cf. http://tinyurl.com/238vq5
Reminds me of this story I heard on NPR recently about the immigration and race in the United States. Specifically about "whites" versus "non-whites." In the beginning, "white" meant Anglo-Saxon. Everyone else wasn't. Eventually, they extended it to the western Europeans, except the Irish. Then the Irish. Then the eastern Europeans. Then the southern Europeans.
They specifically talked about, and to, Greek-Americans, that at one time were "not white," and then became "white." The general theme of the story was about how throughout the years the "whites" would fret over the "non-whites" coming in, and then they'd change the definition of "white," and then in the constant irony of immigration in the USA, the "new whites" if you will, started fretting about the "non-whites."
You won't find a better argument that race is a social construct than the history of "whiteness" in the United States.
Worse. In 1906 you could create a book with pictures of different ethnicities with only the intention of showing a reader some of the diversity of the world. In 2008, someone would call it a collection of half-assed, confused, racist, sexist depictions/descriptions of "race types". And they'd use quotations to show that they don't agree with the term "race types". In 1906, some people were indeed racist. In 2008, we just accuse each other of being racist with the slightest provocation because that's how we let everyone know that we're enlightened.
It's a funny old world.
Two criticisms:
First, the Mongolians were almost certainly not responsible for 9/11.
Second, where did the Japanese dude get a perm? Did they have those in 1906?
#9 VitaminCM
"But it doesn't say which one is best."
Oh but it does. White anglo-saxon is at the top center, blacks at the bottom, American Indian next up, then Asians. The hierarchy is very clear.
K*r does seem to be an odd one out there, the name not having any geographical connection and is derived from arabic for unfaithful/unbeliever.
#13: Er, yeah. You got me! That page with a hierarchy of men of intermingled colors and cultures, all labeled "race types," is clearly an innocent, unbiased attempt at education that we should respect. Sure. You seem to be arguing that I have no right to call a spade a spade.
Considering the era in which this was produced, I think it's actually pretty fair in its depictions.
The African American is shown as a gentleman in formal clothing, while they still were considered by most to be inherently lesser beings.
The native Americans are represented in a similarly respectful manner, despite battles with them having occurred well within the memory of most adults at the time. Custer was killed at Little Bighorn only 2 decades earlier.
It appears to me that this page is mainly a simple (and simple-minded) exploration of how humanity has taken different physical forms in various places in the world. I think the position of "Anglo-Saxons" at top center of the diverse spread of mankind is mainly Ptolemaic in nature. Not necessarily from a sense of superiority (or at least I think not exclusively so), but from a position of ignorance.
On first seeing it, I was immediately impressed that the representations are as visually unbiased as they are. As such it would be so despite the worldview of most European descendants at that time.
If those drawings are to be believed, then, as an Ango-Saxon grows older, he becomes Hebrew.
MirrorMonkey wrote:
K*r does seem to be an odd one out there, the name not having any geographical connection and is derived from arabic for unfaithful/unbeliever.
I reply:
K*r used to be a blanket term for Southern African black people. Occasionally, it was also used as an alias for Xhosa people. Towards the beginning of the 20th century, it was considered acceptable usage (by Europeans), even to the extent of it having an entry in the 1911 Encyclopaedia Britannica.
A proposed origin I have heard (but haven't seen a solid reference for) is that European explorers traders sailing the coast of Africa encountered Arabic traders on the East African coast and asked them who the people living inland were, to which the Arabs replied, dismissively, "heathens".
Some time during the 20th century, it became recognised as an ethnic slur, and popular used as such in South Africa (and reportedly, in Rhodesia). However, even in the 1970s, using the term to someone's face while talking about them was legally actionable. (Of course, if you were a poor, second-class black South African in those days, enforcing your legal rights, little as they were, wasn't always an option.)
Sadly, it's still a term I hear being used by racist white South Africans, although most are sly enough to prefer euphemisms (a la "Canadians").
Olé¡¡¡¡¡¡ that Spanish bullfighting with its suit and its "montera",but to say that not all Spanish bullfighters us in 2008 and not all Spaniards were bullfighters in 1906...
Re:#5 - Well, dang, you learn something new every day. That makes a little more sense, maybe as much sense as a crazy "race types" info page is going to make. Is there a similar deal for "sheik," do you think?
Re:#14 - First, the Mongolians were almost certainly not responsible for 9/11.
I didn't get that at all at first, but when I went back and looked at the page, I totally laughed out loud. Well, I mean, it was more of like a chortle or a snort, but it was an audible sound for sure. (Plus, Mongolians = Chinese, Japanese, Eskimo? What shoddy race-type organizers made this page?)
#17 - Wll, y sm t b rgng tht thy hv n rght t cll n frcn-mrcn spd.
Hr.
@ 21 but to say that not all Spanish bullfighters us in 2008 and not all Spaniards were bullfighters in 1906...
Ah possibly; but it is true that all drunk Anglo Saxons are Scotch highlanders....
I would like to point out that scotch is a drink and it should be Scots or Scottish Highlander, not that the guy in the drawing looks like anyone I have ever met north of Inverness unless they were on a tin of shortbread
I must be an outlier. I don't appear to resemble the Hebrew race type at ALL.
Ah, the construction of race. I remember fondly the days when Germans were barely white people.
“Why should Pennsylvania … become a Colony of aliens, who will shortly be so numerous as to Germanize us, instead of our Anglifying them, and will never adopt our language or customs, any more than they can acquire our complexion?” [1751]
Franklin had even harsher words for German “frauleins”:
“The German Women are generally so disagreable to an English Eye, that it would require great Portions [of wealth] to induce Englishmen to marry them.” [1753]
Klokwerk (13), what bug got up your nose?
...
I see a number of remarkable features in that illustration. Clearly, the microscopic differences between Scots and Anglo-Saxons are worth illustrating, but the Mediterranean world gets one perfunctory Greek, and the peoples of South and Central America aren't there at all. The American Negro is placed as far as possible from the Anglo-Saxon -- no danger of adducing a relationship there! Moreover, the American Negro is shown as being significantly darker than the Africans, which if you're taking averages is absolutely not true.
The other thing I'd conclude from that photo is that losing fights with the Anglo-American world causes you to develop circles under your eyes.
Man, if Greeks still dressed like that I'd definitely eat a lot more kebabs.
Seems a lot of the "races" are defined more by their clothing than anything else-- if the Anglo-Saxon traded clothes with the Russian, or the Sioux with the Ute, who would know the difference?
In many senses the terms people used to refer to race back then were better, or at least less confusing, than the ones we use today. For example:
• "African American" refers to nationality, not race.
• From an objective standpoint "black" would seem to be a more degrading term for brown-skinned people than "negroid."
• The term "Latino" refers to language, not race. Same deal with "Hispanic."
• "White" is just as inaccurate and simplistic as "black."
Granted, the politics of racial nomenclature are a very sticky subject. That's why I try to just call people whatever they want to be called.
"Ethiopian" came from a Greek word that means "burnt", as people thought African skin looked like it was burnt.
The bug up Klokwerk's nose is likely the same one that got up mine.
As arbitrary (and even specious) as some of this book's distinctions may be, it's clearly meant to inspire wonder at the many faces of humankind. It's far more enlightened to celebrate H. Sapien's racial diversity than to excoriate those who refuse to deny such diversity exists. It would indeed have been racist if the author tried to illustrate value judgments based on race. Clearly not the case.
In that sense, this book from 1906 is more enlightened than much of the commentary here in 2008.
Malarkey, Unusual Subject. No one here has ever said that racial diversity doesn't exist, much less excoriated anyone for refusing to agree with that opinion.
What are you on about?
"racial diversity" does not exist. Any trivial differences in phenotype and genotype attributed to the concept of "race" are so utterly unimportant that no rational person would mark them as extraordinary.
now, ask me about "culture"
"It would indeed have been racist if the author tried to illustrate value judgments based on race. Clearly not the case."
Actually, Unusual Suspect, I might point out that the Anglo-Saxon sits atop this chart, black people at the bottom, and other sorts of fellows (women, obviously, being outside the scope of the author's discussion) in the middle.
It's pretty obvious that the subtext here is that the races are presented in order of civilization.
My copy of The Wall Chart of World History (which I've had since 1988 and which I believe dates from around the turn of the 20th century) has a similar collection of images in it, just broken down into fewer categories:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/kostia/2230983727/
"racial diversity" does not exist.
Humans are genetically monolithic. I've heard that there can be more genetic diversity between individual chimpanzees than exists between a chimp and a human, let alone between humans. Odd that our minimal genetic variability comes out so strongly in appearance, vis-a-vis other species.
"so strongly in appearance" is a relative opinion.
To my species,you all look alike. And taste like chicken" (Kang)
When I worked in a hospital, I discovered that once you strip off the make-up and the hair-do and put on a hospital gown, it's pretty hard to even distinguish the genders let alone ethnicity. I can't vouch for the flavor. Although I still hold that vegans would be way tastier.
1906: facial hair is in!
There seems to be some influence from national costume/dress involved here too. To leave out the Scotch Highlander would be to miss an excellent tartan opportunity. Ditto bullfighters.
Including "Sheik" and "Raja" makes more sense if you consider "race" as conflated with professions/ranks which are associated with traditional/stereotypical costumes.
Has anyone mentioned scale? The pictures get smaller as they go down the page. Grouping what people consider black, indian and asian people together would give each more contrast compared to others in their group. Try this test: Can you tell the difference between a korean, chinese and japanese people? http://www.alllooksame.com/
Page hierarchy aside, It looks like they all get a pretty respectable treatment. I have Australian annuals from the 20's and they're making explicitly racist jokes.