Africoid

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Africoid is a term to denote people of African decent.

Contents 1 An inclusive term 2 Analysis of Afrocentric claims 2.1 Bias in previous scholarship 2.1.1 Population variability 2.1.2 Lumping of population data under Mediterranean clusters 2.2 Use of racial categories in modern DNA studies 2.3 Africoid as a term incorporating Oceanic, Indic and Australoid peoples 3 Scholarly use of the term Africoid descriptive of local populations 4 See also 5 References

[edit] An inclusive term

A broader term, Africoid is used to describe or refer to black peoples traditionally known as Negroes. It is also used to refer to other peoples, however, who often as well have been referred to as black (and also sometimes Negroid), but whom some anthropologists also have termed Caucasoid, Capoid, Australoid (also known as Veddoid when applied to Southeast Asians), or Sudroid, because they are non-Africans or because they exhibit certain faciocranial characteristics, chief among them limited or nonexistent prognathism (in the case of blacks whom some have termed "Caucasoid"), a brachycephalic cranium (in the case of Capoid blacks), or hair which is relatively straight and finer in texture (in the case of, again, some "Caucasoid", Sudroid, Veddoid, and Australoid blacks). The concept is somewhat based on the work of Senegalese scholar Cheik Anta Diop, ^[1] and writers like Chancellor Williams.^[2]

Proponents of the term point to groups like some Egyptians, Ethiopians, Eritreans, Somalis and Nubians who exhibit a wide range of characteristics that cannot be pigeonholed into certain "classic" Negroid traits, while themselves vary among their compatriates south of the Sahara. Such variations it is held, are indigenous to the group and do not depend on invasions from outside Caucasoid peoples as alleged under the old Dynastic Race Theory, or newer biological studies. Indeed, such variations, in fact, often occur within nuclear family groups. It has been argued that such phenotypical variations are inherent to Africoid peoples, much as there are broad variations in physical stature and body proportions between the Pygmies of the Congo, who generally reach a height of 4.5 feet, and of the Tutsi of East Africa, whose average height is 6.5 feet and who are described as gracile, or gracefully slender. Similarly, other black African peoples commonly considered Negroid, such as the Senegalese also may lack alveolar prognathism.

Additionally, other indigenous, black African peoples exhibit other physical characteristics beyond the scope of the classic Negroid phenotype, including relatively narrow nasal indices in the case of many often very dark-skinned, black peoples of the Nile region and the African Horn and epicanthic eyefolds in the case of the Khoisan, who over time have ranged across the length and breadth of the African continent.

Afrocentrists have observed that Caucasoid is applied inconsistently and challenge as eurocentric and inappropriate the use of a term which contains a European geographic referrent to refer to indigenous, black Africans. Further, they argue that the term is misleading and that, as a result, it erroneously has been conflated by some to mean non-black or even white — despite the fact that so-called Caucasoid indigenous African blacks range from brown to blue-black in skin tone. This is also the case with some "Caucasoid" peoples of the Indian subcontinent, whom some Afrocentrists regard as Africoid, as well.^[3]

Afrocentrists contend that affixing the Caucasoid label to African peoples runs counter to phenotypical naming conventions, which historically have associated peoples with their geographic points of origin. They, therefore, have been the chief proponents and users of the term Africoid as a more accurate, inclusive and all-encompassing term for the indigenous black peoples of the African continent and the African diaspora.^[4]

[edit] Analysis of Afrocentric claims

[edit] Bias in previous scholarship

Afrocentrics argue that scholarship on peoples in Africa, and Northeast Africa in particular, shows a pattern of bias, and claim that this pattern shows the need for better terminology in describing African populations. In addition it is claimed that the wide variations found in the Northeast Africa are part and parcel of indigenous populations, and that the definition of "African" cannot be confined to a region south of the Sahara (Diop, Cheikh Anta, The African Origin of Civilization). ^[5] In relation to Northeast populations like the Egyptians, Afrocentrists like Diop allege that (a) selective or extreme definitions are associated with determining the class "Negroid" and (b) broad, expansive definitions of the term "Caucasoid" are used to incorporate all other evidence not fitting the extreme stereotype. Some mainstream scholars generally concur with a number of Diop's observations, while critical of other Afrocentric theories of Eygptian inspired cross-continent cultural unity.^[6] A review of the scholarly literature as regards allegations of bias reveals a number of patterns:

[edit] Population variability

Modern re-analyses of previous studies shows a clear tendency to sometimes minimize variability within certain northeast African populations.^[7], As far as Negroid elements, ^[8]this takes the form of establishing a baseline determination for a "true negro" (generally a sub-Saharan type) and anything not closely matching this extreme type is disregarded or incorporated into a Caucasoid cluster. However the same selective classification scheme is not applied to groups traditionally categorized as Caucasoid. Writers such as Carelton Coons report "Mediterranean" remains that seem to have "Negroid" traits but do not mention the opposite, nor do such scholars apply the same selective definition approach with populations of the Levant, Maghreb or those further north. Scholars for example have generally made no similar attempt to define a "true white." ^[9]

[edit] Lumping of population data under Mediterranean clusters

Re-analyses of scholarship also show a tendency to sometimes lump certain types of data, such as skeletical remains under broad clusters or categories such as Mediterranean. Numerous studies of Egyptian crania have been undertaken, with many showing a range of types, and workers often describing substantial Negroid remains. Often this type has been lumped into a Caucasoid cluster, typically using the term "Mediterranean." A majority of these studies show the strong influence of Sudanic and Saharan elements in the predynastic populations and yet classification systems often incorporate them into the Mediterranean grouping.

"Analyses of Egyptian crania are numerous. Vercoutter (1978) notes that ancient Egyptian crania have frequently all been “lumped (implicitly or explicitly) as Mediterranean, although Negroid remains are recorded in substantial numbers by many workers.. The majority of the work describes a Negroid element, especially in the southern population and sometimes as predominating in the predynastic period (Falkenburger, 1947).. ^[10]

[edit] Use of racial categories in modern DNA studies

Some reseachers hold that older racial categories and stereotypical definitions are still in use, plugged with data not from older style cranium measurements, but modern DNA studies. Controversial categories like Extra-European Caucasoid to incorporate various North African peoples like the Egyptians, Ethiopians, and others, for example, have drawn criticism from some scholars along these lines. ^[11] Other DNA studies in turn throw doubt on "classical" racial categories. The nuclear DNA work of researcher Ann Bowcock (1991, 1994) for example, suggests that such primary groupings as Europeans may be flawed, and that such peoples arose as a consequence of admixture between certain already differentiated African and Asian ancestral stocks. Under this approach to the DNA data, Caucasians are thus not a primary grouping as in the classical categories, but a secondary type or race, due to their supposedly hybrid origins.^[12][13]

Anthropologists such as Lieberman and Jackson (1995), also find numerous methodological and conceptual problems with using DNA sequencing methods such as cladistics to support concepts of race. The hold for example that: "the molecular and biochemical proponents of this model explicitly use racial categories in their initial grouping of samples They suggest that the authors of these studies find support for racial distinctions only because they began assuming the validity of race (Leiberman and Jackson 1995 "Race and Three Models of Human Origins" in American Anthropologist 97(2) 231-242)^[14]

Whatever the approach used, modern DNA studies have in many ways undermined traditional racial categories in favor of a population variant/gradient or continuum approach. This includes not only the various models that allocate peoples like Ethiopians to "Caucasoid" groupings, but Afrocentric conceptions of a single black type as well.

[edit] Africoid as a term incorporating Oceanic, Indic and Australoid peoples

While some Afrocentrists insist on the primacy of phenotypes in describing a broad cultural-genetic set of black peoples stretching from Africa to Australia, modern DNA and serological (blood)analysis places populations like Australian Aborigines, Dravidians of India and dark-skinned Pacific/Indian Ocean peoples closer to the populations of mainland East Asia than the stereotypical sub-Saharan Negroid phenotype. ^[15]

[edit] Scholarly use of the term Africoid descriptive of local populations

Some mainstream scholars advocate a non-racial terminology more directly based on the local variability of the population data, and its changes over time, holding that this allows for a wide range of types and variation, and that continued use of racial definitions and concepts are problematic:

"Much of the previous work focused on “racial” analysis. The concept of race is problematic, and (‘racial” terms have been inconsistently defined and used in African historiography as noted recently (MacGaffey, 1966; Sanders, 1969; Vercoutter, 1978).. There is little demarcation between the predynastics and tropical series and even the early southern dynastic series. Definite trends are discernible in the analyses. This broadly shared "southern" metric pattern, along with the other mentioned characteristics to a greater or lesser degree, might be better described by the term Africoid, by definition connoting a tropical African microclade, microadaptation, and patristic affinity, thereby avoiding the nonevolutionary term "Negroid" and allowing for variation both real and conceptual."^[16]

[edit] See also

• Australoid
• Capoid
• Caucasoid
• Negroid
• Veddoid

[edit] References