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Re: New uses of "race"
Jay Kotliar (ARKYJAY@AOL.COM)
Mon, 9 Oct 1995 10:03:41 -0400
While I agree with Dwight's points about race as 1. a social construct, and
2. its possible use as a referential biological construct varying to
distinguish between various populations and groups with particular allele
frequencies etc. I think that the using the word race to describe these
clusters would not be in the interest of the profession.
I would recommend that biological and physical anthropologists not use
the word race to these very admirable ends, as the word has too much baggage
associated and will tend to confuse rather than illuminate. Rather than
trying to rehabilitate it, I think we should abandon it completely and use
terms that we don't have to be defensive about. Just a thought.
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