[Aztlan] Aztlan Digest, Vol 38, Issue 12

[Sharon Peters]

RE:  Race & Ethnicity discussion
It seems a present and universal sand trap for those investigating the past
- and those serious followers of the writing and studies, to somehow think
that the previous era was one of more peace, or harmony, and certainly
intra-group homogeneity, that was actually the case.  It is very, very
difficult and treacherous work to try and tease out the strands and their
interrelationship of a culture that can only speak to us via potsherds,
ruins, limited writings, and historical accounts ... typically the
impressions, the "take" of an outsider - and in the case of Mesoamerica, not
always, if ever, people with interest in and respect for the cultures they
confronted in the New World (perhaps Sahagun excepted).

Artifacts and household goods - belonging mostly to the elites - may or may
not have been manufactured by the artisan or working classes of the same
group.  That is, the hands making those items may have been captives or
slaves ... from another culture, related or no.  What expressions of the
elites' culture and what of the makers' is evidenced in that pot, or fabric,
etc.  For pedestrian reference, a quick review of the ceiling of Santa Maria
Tonanzin in Tonanzintla, Puebla gives an idea.  It is a Catholic church ...
but the indigenous groups that did that ceiling ... it is lush, pagan, and
glorious.  Now,  a millenia from now ... what will researchers make of that?

I think the only hope for doing justice to the past is to enter into the
narrow cave of one's particular passion or expertise, and to bring it out,
put it down, ,and stand far away from just it, viewing the whole scene where
it was found.  Does it occur that a  - perhaps the - crucial missing item
from this study is language?  In the absence of hearing the common discourse
of the site, we are left to put the puzzle together .... and we will need
all of the tools at our command, whether they lie within our realm of
expertise or that of a colleague, or an informed, and passionately
interested, bystander.

I am a linguist, who has done a tour of the ethnic kitchen - especially
those of Mexico - and who has recently returned to grad school in
lingistics.  We need the language, but to really, really learn it and from
it, we need the archaeologists, sociologists, anthropologists, etc.

And as for the observation that "race is simply ethnicity with a supposed
biological basis ...", I give you for thought the observation of Joshua
Fishman, sociolinguist par excellence, on dialects:  "A language is a
dialect with an army and a navy."   I think, in many ways, the same can be
said of race and ethnicity.

Regards,
Sharon Peters

On Wed, Jan 14, 2009 at 12:00 PM, <aztlan-request en lists.famsi.org> wrote:

>
>   8. Re: Aztlan Digest, Vol 38, Issue 10 (Jaime Andres Pretell)
>
>
> > Race is simply ethinicity with a supposed biological basis.
> > Anthropologists talk about population, not races (anymore). What you are
> > talking about is ethnicity. Was there a presumed biological difference
> > in the minds of the Maya? Perhaps, but that is not something that we can
> > know archaeologically (or even ethnohistorically, in my opinion). We
> > can, however, distinguish clear differences between archaeological
> > populations in Honduras, in their material culture, architecture, etc..
> > The Maya, at least the elite, were very clearly concerned ancestry, but
> > the 'Lenca' probably were as well and may have considered their own
> > culture better than the Maya, much as many people around the world today
> > believe that their own cultures, though perhaps not as technologically
> > complex, are better than those in the Western world.
> >
> > I would suggest that recognition of "race" is a "preoccupation" with
> > "race". The scientific recognition of biological differences between
> > populations is however an important scientific endeavor. Race is an
> > extremely slippery concept, but which populations have which skeletal
> > traits can be identified relatively easily. Note that these populations
> > rarely line up with our popular conceptions of "race".
> >
> > Race can very easily change. The same person can be Black or African
> > American in the US, but brunette in Brazil.
> >
> > Ben
>
>
>
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> End of Aztlan Digest, Vol 38, Issue 12
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