On the Concept of Race in Chinese Biological Anthropology: Alive and Well

QianWang,; Gorantrkalj,; LiSun,

doi:10.1086/374899

Cited by 21 publications

(6 citation statements)

References 3 publications

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“…The status of minority groups in China as racial groups has become a focal point of controversies about global boundaries of race (Dikötter 2015;Law 2012;Wang et al 2003). Indeed, it is uncontroversial that prejudice and discrimination have been common in China both in historical relations to border communities and current attitudes towards minorities such as Tibetans and Uighurs.…”

Section: Tibetan and Uighur: Addressing Boundary Disputesmentioning

confidence: 99%

How race travels: relating local and global ontologies of race

Ludwig

2018

Philos Stud

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This article develops a framework for addressing racial ontologies in transnational perspective. In contrast to simple contextualist accounts, it is argued that a globally engaged metaphysics of race needs to address transnational continuities of racial ontologies. In contrast to unificationist accounts that aim for one globally unified ontology, it is argued that questions about the nature and reality of race do not always have the same answers across national contexts. In order address racial ontologies in global perspective, the article develops a framework that accounts for both continuities and discontinuities by looking beyond the referents of narrowly defined core concepts. By shifting the focus from narrow concepts to richer conceptions of race, racial ontologies become comparable through globally related but nonetheless distinct mappings between conceptions and property relations. The article concludes by showing how this framework can generate novel insights in case studies from Asia, Europe, and Latin America.

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Section: Tibetan and Uighur: Addressing Boundary Disputesmentioning

confidence: 99%

How race travels: relating local and global ontologies of race

Ludwig

2018

Philos Stud

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“…The authors concluded that the rejection of the concept (as understood by the experts in question) "varies from high to low with highest rejection of race occurring amongst physical anthropologists in the United States, other English speaking nations (mostly Canada), and Poland; moderate rejection of race in Europe; and sizeable, though quite low, rejection of race evidenced in Poland and Cuba." After conducting a review of articles published in the People's Republic of China's leading journal of anthropology, Acta Anthropologica Sinica, Wang, Strkalj, and Sun (2003) concluded that race-like concepts were "alive and well" in Chinese anthropology. Kaszycka, Štrkalj, and Strzałko (2009) found that a majority of European anthropologists agreed that there were races either in the sense of taxa subspecies or in some other sense.…”

Section: Iv-b Human Biological Races and Scientific Consensusmentioning

confidence: 99%

The Nature of Race: the Genealogy of the Concept and the Biological Construct’s Contemporaneous Utility

Fuerst¹

2015

OBG

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Racial constructionists, anti-naturalists, and anti-realists have challenged users of the biological race concept to provide and defend, from the perspective of biology, biological philosophy, and ethics, a biologically informed concept of race. In this paper, an ontoepistemology of biology is developed. What it is, by this, to be "biological real" and "biologically meaningful" and to represent a "biological natural division" is explained. Early 18th century race concepts are discussed in detail and are shown to be both sensible and not greatly dissimilar to modern concepts. A general biological race concept (GBRC) is developed. It is explained what the GBRC does and does not entail and how this concept unifies the plethora of specific ones, past and present. Other race concepts as developed in the philosophical literature are discussed in relation to the GBRC. The sense in which races are both real and natural is explained. Racial essentialism of the relational sort is shown to be coherent. Next, the GBRC is discussed in relation to anthropological discourse. Traditional human racial classifications are defended from common criticisms: historical incoherence, arbitrariness, cluster discordance, etc. Whether or not these traditional human races could qualify as taxa subspeciesor even speciesis considered. It is argued that they could qualify as taxa subspecies by liberal readings of conventional standards. Further, it is pointed out that some species concepts potentially allow certain human populations to be designated as species. It is explained why, by conventional population genetic and statistical standards, genetic differences between major human racial groups are at least moderate. Behavioral genetic differences associated with human races are discussed in general and in specific. The matter of race differences in cognitive ability is briefly considered. Finally, the race concept is defended from various criticisms. First, logical and empirical critiques are dissected. These include: biological scientific, sociological, ontological, onto-epistemological, semantic, and teleological arguments. None are found to have any merit. Second, moral-based arguments are investigated in context to a general ethical frame and are counter-critiqued. Racial inequality, racial nepotism, and the "Racial Worldview" are discussed. What is dubbed the Anti-Racial Worldview is rejected on both empirical and moral grounds. Finally, an area of future investigationthe politics of the destruction of the race conceptis pointed to.

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“…The concept also appears alive and well among Chinese anthropologists. Examining a large number of Chinese anthropological articles about human variation, Wang, Strkali, and Sun (:403) found that “all of the articles used the race concept and none of them questioned its value.”…”

Section: The Aaa Statement and Lewontin's Fallacymentioning

confidence: 99%

Race and Criminology in the Age of Genomic Science

Walsh

Yun

2011

Social Science Quarterly

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Objective. To survey the contemporary literature in the social and biological sciences relevant to race that examines both the reality and the usefulness of the concept. Race is considered a major correlate of criminal behavior, and thus a fresh look at the concept is of obvious importance to criminologists and sociologists. Method. Social, genetic, medical, and criminology databases were keyword searched for articles on race that either addressed its existence/nonexistence or usefulness as a concept. Results. We find that biologist and social constructionists talk past one another and never venture beyond the comfort of their own positions. Genetic studies using very few chromosomal loci find that genetic polymorphisms divide human populations into clusters with almost 100 percent accuracy and that they correspond to the traditional anthropological categories. Conclusion. There is much to gain by recognizing that these categories differ genetically, and that we can dispense with the term race in favor of some other term such as population or ethnic group and nothing would be lost except a word

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On the Concept of Race in Chinese Biological Anthropology: Alive and Well

Cited by 21 publications

References 3 publications

How race travels: relating local and global ontologies of race

How race travels: relating local and global ontologies of race

The Nature of Race: the Genealogy of the Concept and the Biological Construct’s Contemporaneous Utility

Race and Criminology in the Age of Genomic Science

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