ETHNICITY, RACE, AND CULTURE

Ethnicity, Race and Culture have been topics of endless academic debate and discussion among social theorists, social anthropologists, and scholars and constituents of various other disciplines in attempts to define, apply, justify, and rationalize, among other things, group and individual behavior in social contexts. I am here for none of that. I am here to challenge these ideas, specifically, the idea of ethnicity and it’s connections to race, culture, and often nationality.

To frame my challenge I reiterate, as I often will:

My critique is simply to view the issues in the context of “normative” and “literal” definitions of the concepts upon which they rest. First, by “normative” I mean that definition which is expected based on traditional or accepted usage in social contexts or...a subjective definition. By “literal” I mean simply that definition which is understood in the strictest sense of the terms given; the objective definition.

Let’s get right into it then:

Race as: a group with common ancestry

Culture as: a way of life incorporating traditions and customs

Ethnicity: ??????

Among various scholars ethnicity is a vague concept with an unclear definition. The definitions given always include some reference to race and culture and sometimes include nationality. Often these definitions will also include references language, tradition, and custom. This is redundant, as language, tradition, and custom are aspect of culture. So what is ethnicity?

The normative definition of ethnicity is identity or membership in a particular racial, national, or cultural group and observance of that group’s customs, beliefs, and language. So ethnicity means belonging to a particular group as defined by race or common ancestry; nation or country of origin; culture or a traditional way of life and adhering to that group’s traditional way of life. If I’m to understand this correctly, it means that if my race is white, my nation is France, and my culture is French and I act, believe, and speak French then my ethnicity is French, correct? According to the normative definition… (If I have understood it correctly) yes. Well then, what if my race is black with an ancestry from Senegal, my nation is France, my culture is French, and I act, believe, and speak French? Am I still ethnically French?

Another supposed normative definition of ethnicity is that it represents a condition where a minority population exists within a larger mainstream population with a separate culture, different from that of the dominant culture. So White Jews in Europe represent an ethnicity, where as mainstream Europeans (whatever mainstream means) do not? Yes, according to this normative definition. In this normative sense many people who refer to ethnicity, but never actually defined the term tie it into minority issues and race. Scholars, such as social anthropologists tie ethnicity to relationships among people who consider themselves distinct in a cultural sense. And so these scholars frame ethnicities around the world as subnational groups or minorities with their own separate culture or race or both. Does this mean that majority populations do not have ethnicity?

In my understanding of these two normative definitions there is an ongoing debate; the normative definitions of any concept rest on the everyday usage of the term as an abstract and amorphous concept which loosely ties together concrete and defined realities. Now abstractions or perceptual/conceptual information that is integrated by our minds in order to form more complex concepts connecting to concrete reality are necessary and should not be amorphous or without a logical form. When they are we risk endless debate on the validity of these abstractions. Such is the case with ethnicity and the definitions available for it. As such, the definitions given for ethnicity have no substantive meaning or material significance. What I mean by this is that ethnicity is a vague concept; most people neither know what ethnicity means nor what is meant by it in everyday (normative) use.

This is perhaps one of the most troublesome issues I have come across for any concept in my existence. Why? Let’s take a look at the literal definition for ethnicity: …. Correct. There is no literal definition-meaning there is no strict, objective definition for the concept of ethnicity. A contradiction (only conceptually, ensues) or an error in judgment has occurred. Error; but on the part whom? Well, more importantly; why is there no literal definition for ethnicity? As state earlier, it is a vague concept only understood in the normative sense without the benefit of an objective reality (and thus a standard) on which to be grounded. Again as stated earlier; definitions of concepts involve connecting abstract perceptual/conceptual information taken from the material universe (the objective standard) through our senses, as well as previously formed concepts and integrating them into meaningful categorizations based on the distinctive features of that information into units of knowledge (concepts). Thus, conceptualizing is defining. But in the conceptualizing of ethnicity the perceptual/conceptual information forming the units of knowledge comprising the whole concept are not unified by any distinctive feature(s); which results in a misaligned and dislocated conceptual framework or an invalid concept. Race, nation, and culture-the perceptual/conceptual pieces-the qualifications and associated experiences for the identity or membership of an ethnicity share no causal relationship amongst themselves*. There is no necessary and sufficient condition in which a connection between race and nation or race and culture can be made. There are a number of reasons for this lack of a causal link, but I will only refer to the relevant ones for this analysis. In doing so we must now take looks at normative and literal conceptions of race to be followed by the same in culture.

Race normatively speaking is a socio-cultural construct or, in my minimalist/reductionist view, “an idea I’ll grudgingly accept for the sake of argument” (back to this later). As stated earlier we will take race as a classification of people with common ancestry; notice ancestry is undefined, but I understand it as a history of physical features*. However, in terms of modern genetics even the sharing of physical features only guarantees similarity in appearance, which is insignificant biologically. In human genetics there is no biological basis for race. This is to be taken as, on the level of genetic composition there is no difference or distinctive characteristic among individuals. What accounts for the difference in appearance of individuals is simply the activation of genes by a combination of environmental factors and the programming directives of the genetic code, but the actual genetic template or genome is the same for all humans. So while there can be DNA admixtures among individuals and groups, or differences in the particular arrangement and expression of genes, all humans must develop from the same genetic archetype.

So this brings us to the literal definition of race. That definition is the one given at the beginning of this posting. People with shared physical features; it is important to note that ancestry means a history of physical features and nothing else, not culture or nation, a literal definition. However, this is hardly sufficient and I must further delineate that shared physical features includes certain ones and exclude others. The ones excluded would be those that define humans in general: two arms, two legs, two opposable thumbs, and a head with two eyes, among other things, standing erect and using spoken language to represent thought and communicate; while the included ones would be those physically distinguishing people in particular: skin color, hair texture, and proportion of facial characteristics, on average, to overall head size**. Again, the included features are not materially significant, because of lack of a biological foundation for their assertion as criteria for classification. Thus, there is no objective standard with which to apply race to any individual or group, leading further to the difficulty in maintaining my literal definition. However, despite the lack of biological basis for race on there is still the fact that normatively (or subjectively) it represents the conceptualization of a physical reality understood as a product of socio-cultural interaction. Meaning that there is no literal definition of race as I have presented it; so why have I called race “an idea I’ll grudgingly accept for the sake of argument”? Recall that I stated ethnicity has no literal definition at all because it is only understood in the normative and it lacks the benefit of an objective standard upon which it can be applied to demonstrate validity in the material universe***. Race is understood in a normative sense as well, but also has a connection to reality-common ancestry (physical features)-and as such can arguably be called something real. So for the sake of argument I accept race as a classification in its relevancy for looking at individuals distinctively.

Culture, normatively speaking, is the sum of behaviors, which include language, traditions, and customs, repeated over generations that distinguish a group from other groups. Normatively, culture is a social phenomenon where the group is the subject and life is the object; the subject acts upon the object, the results of which are a common understanding of how to continue acting in order to maintain an identity. The problem with this normative definition is the understanding of what a group is. Groups are not an entity. Groups do not exist independently of their constituent parts. Groups only exist through the existence of the individuals comprising the group. As such, culture is not the product of a group, but the product of individuals. But individuals do not sit at the table and say, “come brothers and sisters, let us produce culture together”. So how does culture come about?

Let us look at the literal definition then:

The literal definition of culture is stated earlier in the post as well and is related to the normative with the exception that no causal or necessary link is made between culture and groups. Culture is not the product of groups. Culture is the product of individuals, as are all its various aspects. Groups attain culture when individuals engage in mutual agreement on ways of life as tradition and custom for various reasons. Essentially, the agreement of individuals on a way of life makes them a group with a culture. But culture is not produced with a unified conscious directed effort of individuals or groups no more than language is produced in such a way. Culture, as well as language, is produced in a process where individuals are simply attempting to live life in a way that promotes further living. In short, culture evolves.

Any understanding of groups should be the same as that with any other classification; that independent entities are recognized as sharing characteristics. The fact that sharing characteristics make some entities distinguishable from others also sharing characteristics, whatever the numerical value of others in relation to the first set of entities is irrelevant. So any classification of individuals as a group is that they share characteristics. That is all. This last point makes the definition of ethnicity as minority, as done in the second normative definition I gave, irrelevant…so much for that.

What about ethnicity in the first normative definition? Well, race and culture along with nationality are, normatively, the determinants of ethnicity according to this normative definition. I say determinants, because there is an ongoing debate about whether ethnicity is a choice or something you’re born into. I have heard the absurdity that ethnicity is a biological fact independent of culture, language, nationality, or ancestry while also being defined those very same elements or classifications. Huh?

I have also heard the absurdity that one can choose one’s ethnicity no matter where or when one is born and no matter what language, race, or culture in which one grows up. Huh?

To the former: you mean to tell me that I’m am ethnically Japanese even if I’m born and raised in Spain, observe Spanish customs and only speak Spanish simply because my parents are Japanese. To this I ask; why? In what sense am I Japanese? Nationally? culturally? racially? If any or all of these…what is the link to ethnicity? Nationally, I’m Spanish. Culturally, I’m Spanish. Racially, for the sake of argument, I’m asian (let's just say Japanese), even though I’m not biologically established as Japanese since there is no biological basis for race. Huh?

To the latter: you mean to tell me that if I was born and raised in Japan, observe Japanese customs and only speak Japanese I can claim to be ethnically Spanish simply because I so choose. Huh?

Well then, in the former deterministic view of ethnicity, the only link to the ethnicity of Japanese is racial. Ah, and therein lies one of the major problems of ethnicity. Ethnicity’s connection to race in this context suggests ethnicity as race. Unnecessary: as race is a concept that can stand alone, even if for the sake of argument. There is no need for an additional concept meaning the same thing in a different form (which is a common occurrence in languages, especially those derived from the Phoenician alphabet). The difference between the connection of ethnicity to race and synonyms is that synonyms mean the same things openly. The proponents of ethnicity in this context attempt to envelope race into its fold without stating it explicitly. This is dangerous because they simultaneously attempt to make race a coincidental factor in its vague definition while also knowing that it must be an integral one. But equating ethnicity with race alone does not makes things dangerous or explain why a dangerous situation is possible.

In the latter optional view of ethnicity, the only link to the ethnicity of Spanish is choice. I’m all for choice, since it is all we have in many respects, but racial and cultural identification are not one of those respects. They, racial and cultural identification are a matter of birth. Race as a matter of birth because of the ancestral group one is born into, despite basic genetic sameness with all humans. Culture as a matter of birth, because of the cultural group, individuals sharing a particular way of life, one is born into****. At the most, this is the only connection between race and culture; the individual. At the least, this is the only valid connection.

This point of connection between race and culture fixes the point of the potential danger of the invalid concept of ethnicity. Ethnicity is invalid as a concept, because its proponents, whether consciously or not, are tying together race and culture along with nationality. As stated earlier, there is no connection, specifically no causal connection, between race and nationality. One’s nationality does not presuppose or determine race. The same is the condition between race and culture; there is no causal link between race and culture. One’s race does not determine, nor presuppose one’s culture. There is no such thing as, “I am Black; therefore, I listen to Rap music as a matter of biological and historical fact”. Likewise, there is no such thing as, “I am White; but since I choose to listen to Rap music I am now Black”. My concern is that ethnicity, as “defined” by social anthropologists and “ethnic” scholars and understood by people in everyday speak, is that it suggests exactly this connection between race, culture, and nationality-further suggesting that one or the other presupposes or determines another or vice versa.

If race determined culture as the concept of ethnicity suggests, the mapping of the human genome during the Human Genome Project, begun in the 90’s, would have led to the discovery of race-specific genes that determine the behaviors of people based on race-oh wait, the problem with that is there is no genetic basis for race so…um…yeah; exactly. Race, even for the sake of argument, and culture are separate classifications of individuals with no link between them except for the individual.

So this leaves us with the only materially significant classifications for individuals in regard to those mentioned; which are race, though only for the sake of argument in regard to how individuals look; culture, in regard to how individuals live; and nationality, in regard to where individuals live as citizens. No one behaves a certain way, because of their race or as a result of the particular country they were born in. Ethnicity is not a valid classification, because, it is not a valid concept.

A Stupid Idea...

*this understanding actually only makes the classification of species valid; consequently, the only valid race with regard to humans is the human one. A trite argument, true, but sound nonetheless.

**a loose definition to be sure.

***As such, I have advanced that for a concept to be valid it must satisfy the condition of being able to be defined in the literal sense or to be defined normatively with a connection to reality. This is because at some point, all normative (traditional or social accepted) definitions had some degree of connection to reality. Note that connection to reality does not mean objectivity.

****This does not mean one cannot choose a culture with which to identify, but at the point when one can do so they have already been raised in a particular culture. Observing the another culture only adds to what the individual holds in their experience on the whole; you do not escape identification in any fundamental sense.