Race and Culture
We Europeans. By Julian S. Huxley and A. C. Haddon, with a chapter on Europe Overseas, by A. M. Carr-Saunders. (Jonathan. Cape, Ss. 6d.) THERE is no need at this time to stress the relevance and interest of race problems for the modern world. With the .segregation .policy. in South Africa, the quota system of immigration in the United States of America..and its " Jim Crow " regulations in the south, and the Aryan laws in Germany, pronouncements , upon racial affinity have moved .from the laboratory or lecture hall of .the University to the Department of Justice—or the Ministry. of Propagariclaef the State.
• As a result people interested in the fate of their fellow- human beings are beginning .to ask such questions as " 'What is. ,race.?," " How far have claims to racial unity a basis in reality ? " "how can one recognise the, racial affinities of pea ? " • " Do different races have a different. psychological .charagter ? " The scientist, who views his generalisations .dis- passionately, looks, upon them simply as hypotheses to be tested and applies himself to the study of the actual. human material before him, has long known the ,answer. He is well aware that the term race . as applied to human beings is usually very vague, that it covers several distinct meanings, and that in none of these meanings does. it form a, basis for any simple classification of people. If used it should refer to grouping by resemblance in physical traits. But from the dirtiest days of human history such has been the mobility of Man in trekking about the globe, and the catholicity of his 'taste in mating with members of other groups encountered, that practically every community now hi existence includes a considerable number of physical types and a range of combina- tions of them. It is impossible to find a human race in any- thing approaching " purity." Even in the most remote areas primitive folk such as the aborigines of Australia, the Veddas of Ceylon, the Ainu, the Eskimo, are the result of crossing in ancient times. And when we come to modern Europe such has been the intermixture of stocks that there is no knowing what may be the precise racial composition of any individual. External features—hair, eyes, stature and the like—tell us little ; these are but the façade behind which the main structural elements are concealed. The hereditary constitution of the individual is comprised of thousands of genes, units of matter in the cell nucleus, and the characters that we normally take as racial indices are simply a minute fraction of the whole. Moreover, it is practically impossible to say in a given case how far a character is due to genetic factors and how far to environmental influences.
And if we know so little about race in man and the factors on which physical character depends we know still less about how, if at all, physical characters arc correlated with psycho- logical disposition and this in turn with capacity for cultural achievement. More concretely, there are absolutely no reliable observations which tell us anything of value regarding the temperament and mentality of tall fair people, for instance, and it is quite impossible to predict what contribution.they can make to any community life. It is just as absurd to attempt to predict from the measurement 'of. brain cortex of negroes that they will never be able 'to adapt themselves to, our civilisation, or shape: an. equivalent, one for themselves.
These points and, many others the authors of this very timely book have discussed. On first opening the volume the reader is NM fronted by an amusing exercise. There are 16 portraits of Well of different nationality, and one is invited to guess which is which ; the answers are at the end of the book. It is a good humbling test for folk who think that Italians are always dark and Norwegians fair, and that they can pick out a typical German in a crowd. Even the more professional observer will have to choose warily--,indeed one cannot avoid a suspicion that a few of the portraits were deliberately selected because of their resemblance to types of other nationalities I Nationality of course has nothing to do with race, as the authors take care to point out, and they also mention the fact that our judgements of " racial " type are as commonly guided by• cultural criteria—cut of the hair, style of clothes, and so on—as by truly biological characters.
The book, being designed for tile ,:inuAllgent':laynionr is not always easy reading ; it could have been so if the authors had been -more dogmatic and less honest. But the clarity of exposition on such basic matters as the theory of inheritance and ethnic Classification is admirable. Even the most ardent adherent of • modern race doctrines should find it hard after this to prop up again some of the fallacies which have been struck down with such clean-cut blows. It is shown 'veil clearly that there are no pure races of modern man, that no satisfactory pigeon-holing for the various human types now in existence has yet been devised, and that there are no adequate methods for testing innate intelligence as between peoples of different education and culture. Again, it is pointed out that the existence of the Nordic race today can be classed only as a myth, the product of self-interest and avish-fulfilment ; that the most important advances in hliuman civilisation have been made' not by' Nordics but by folk of dark-headed Mediterranean type ; that the Jews do not constitute a definite race °but are a cultural group with a strong religious' basis and peculiar historic traditions ; that so-called " race,conflictg " 'are primarily -cultural conflicts ; 'that the disapproval of miscegenation rests basically on social and' not on biological grounds. Much of 'this is not novel, but there was need for it to be re-stated—as also the point that the word " Aryan" is properly applied only to a group of languages and is quite unscientific when used. for: a group of peoples.
Unfortunately, the demonstration of the inaccuracy of 0 set of labels or slogans is apt to have little effect upon the course of political activity. But at least the issues are clarified. It would be a triumph for science if this work were introduced as a text-book into Germany and the Southern States of America. But this is hardly more likely than that the leader of the Reich will adopt the only logical solution of the race " question—that is, order every " Aryan " to marry into a Jewish family.
RAYMOND FIRTH.
Previous page
