Races of the planet. What races are people divided into?

The species of animals and plants inhabiting the Earth differ in the degree of their variability: some of them are stable, uniform (monomorphic), others, on the contrary, are diverse (polymorphic). Everyone is well aware of the diversity and polymorphism of representatives of the species Homo sapiens - Homo sapiens. People's facial features, body composition, skin color, hair color and structure, and many biochemical indicators vary. Groups of people similar in such characteristics are called races.

How many races of humans live on Earth? It's hard to say, different researchers call different number. The system of races is said to be hierarchical: “large” races, trunks, are divided into branches, branches into local, local races, and those, in turn, into groups of populations. What some anthropologists consider a branch, others classify as a trunk, and vice versa. Most people recognize three trunks - Negroids, Mongoloids and Caucasoids. Some scientists also add two to them - American Indians (Amerindians) and Australoids.

According to most scientists, the main characteristics of races, at the time when they were created, were adaptive, adaptive (see Adaptation). Having separated from the animal world, man remained for a long time (and in some places still is) under the direct influence natural conditions external environment. Then, in the Stone Age, the main features of the main races developed, showing in what climate these groups were formed.

For example, the signs of Negroids are adaptive: dark skin delays ultraviolet radiation, which can cause skin cancer, a wide nose and thick, swollen lips with a large surface of mucous membranes promote evaporation with high heat transfer, curly hair forms a natural “tropical helmet”, abnormal hemoglobin, saving them from tropical malaria.

The characteristics of Mongoloids are also adaptive - a flat and flat-nosed face, a fold in the corner of the eye (epicanthus), creating the impression of slanting. These are adaptations to the harsh continental climate with frequent dust storms. And although Mongoloids are now widespread from the tropics to the Arctic, their most pronounced types are characteristic of Transbaikalia, Mongolia, and Northern China.

Europeans bright skin, permeable to ultraviolet rays, saving them from rickets in childhood, a narrow protruding nose that warms the inhaled air. In the humid and cold climate of Europe, recessive traits (see Dominance) became adaptive - light skin, straight hair, blue and gray eyes.

Sometimes the adaptability of characters is clearly visible. In humans, for example, there are three forms, three alleles of one enzyme - erythrocyte acid phosphatase. The allele designated r a is more common among residents of the Far North (Sami, Aleuts, Eskimos), and the r a allele is found among inhabitants of the equatorial belt. It is calculated that with an increase in geographic latitude by 20°, the frequency of occurrence of the p a allele increases by 10%. The exception is the recent inhabitants of the North - the Yakuts and Evenks. Their “cold-resistant” allele has not yet had time to spread in populations.

At least twice, a complex of characteristics characterizing Negroids arose - in Africa and Melanesia. Curly-haired Melanesians were formed from Australoids - dark-skinned, but with wavy hair. The Tasmanians, now completely exterminated by white colonialists, also looked like Negroids. Some tribes of South American Indians in Brazil and Bolivia also have Negroid characteristics (dark skin, flattened nose, wavy rather than straight hair).

Mongoloid features (epicanthus) are found among the Negroids - Bushmen and Hottentots, who live in southern Africa in harsh desert conditions. And the Caucasoid appearance arose not only in Europe. In Peru, in graves of the 3rd century. BC e. Well-preserved mummies of red, wavy-haired people were discovered, sharply different from the Indians with their black straight hair. Norwegian scientist, traveler and writer Thor Heyerdahl considers them to be descendants of Caucasians who sailed across the Atlantic on papyrus boats. Perhaps the situation was different: the upper castes of the ancient Peruvians had a custom of consanguineous marriages, and at the same time, as we know, recessive alleles appear in the offspring (see Inbreeding). The hair and eyes of the burning brunettes - Indo-Afghans who live in mountainous areas, in small villages, where all the inhabitants are relatives, also lighten.

Amerindians are close to the Mongoloids, but they have a rare epicanthus and often have “eagle” noses. They are called redskins without any justification; their skin is simply dark. Perhaps they descended from the first Mongoloids who went to America even before the classical Mongoloids of Central and Central Asia were finally formed.

Australoids - inhabitants not only of Australia, but also of southern India, Andaman and the Philippines - are a cross between Negroids and Caucasians, they are dark-skinned, but not curly-haired, many have luxuriant beards. In the Stone Age, people similar to them lived in the place where the city of Voronezh now stands. Perhaps they retained more of the features of the common ancestors of these races, which is why they are often combined into a single Euro-African trunk.

Since many structural features of a clearly adaptive nature arise independently in different trunks, the relative proximity of different racial groups is still a subject of heated debate among scientists. Apparently, this issue can be resolved only after the development of modern research methods (comparison of sequences in DNA and proteins, etc.).

Anthropologists still have a lot of work to do. Man is the most restless creature on Earth; even in the Paleolithic era, people roamed for many thousands of kilometers, mixing with each other. This gave rise to a diversity of variants of the Homo sapiens species that is difficult to account for.

Despite extreme diversity, all people on Earth belong to the same species. It is important that all races are equal in mental abilities and in any interracial marriage full-fledged and healthy children are born. Statements about the existence of superior and inferior races, capable and incapable peoples, and other misanthropic, racist theories have no scientific basis.

When distinguishing races of the first (large), second (small) and third order (subraces), as well as anthropological types, they are guided by the principle of the taxonomic value of racial characteristics, depending on the time of formation of the racial trunk and the territory in which this characteristic delimits groups of people. The later a character is formed, the less suitable it is for distinguishing large races. Thus, large races are distinguished primarily by the degree of pigmentation and structural features faces and heads, that is, according to the signs of appearance that have divided humanity since ancient times. Characteristics that can change on their own over time are not suitable for identifying races. (For example, zygomatic size, skull shape - top view).

The antiquity of the origin of a racial trait is determined by the breadth of its geographical distribution. If it appears in many human populations over wide areas of the continent, this indicates an ancient and local formation. Characteristics that change complexly are also an indicator of belonging to a large race.

Famous anthropologist N.N. Cheboksarov in 1951 gave a classification of racial types, which included three large races: Equatorial, or Australo-Negroid, Eurasian, or Caucasian, Asian-American. The major races include a total of 22 minor races, or second-order races. In 1979, Cheboksarov considered it possible to single out the Australoid race separately as a race of the first order.

Big races

Equatorial race (Fig. IX. 1). Dark skin color, wavy or curly hair, wide, slightly protruding nose, low or medium bridge of the nose, transverse nostrils, protruding upper lip, large mouth opening, protruding teeth.

Eurasian race (Fig. IX. 2). Light or dark skin color, straight or wavy hair, abundant growth of beard and mustache, narrow and sharply protruding nose, high nose bridge, longitudinal nostrils, straight upper lip, small mouth slit, thin lips. Light eyes and hair are common. The teeth are set straight. Strong canine fossa. Makes up 2/3 of the Earth's population.

Asian-American race (Fig. IX. 3). Dark skin tone, straight, often coarse hair, weak growth of beard and mustache, average width of the nose, low or average bridge of the nose, weakly (in Asia) and strongly (in America) protruding nose, straight upper lip, average thickness of lips, flattened face, inner fold century.

Distribution of large races. The Eurasian race (before the era of the Great Geographical Discoveries) occupied Europe, North Africa, Western and Central Asia, Middle East, India - temperate and Mediterranean climate, often maritime climate, mild winter.

Distribution of the Asian-American race - Asia, Southeast Asia, Indonesia, Pacific Islands, Madagascar, North and South America— all climatic and geographical zones.

The territories occupied by the equatorial race are south of the Tropic of Cancer in Africa, Indonesia, New Guinea, Melanesia, Australia (savannas, tropical forests, deserts, oceanic islands).

Minor races

Eurasian race

Atlanto-Baltic minor race. The race's habitat is Scandinavia, the British Isles, the northern regions of Western and Eastern Europe.

Represented by Norwegians, Swedes, Scots, Icelanders, Danes, Russians, Belarusians, Baltic peoples, northern French, Germans, Finns. The race is light-skinned, the eyes are most often light, and the hair is often light. Beard growth is average to above average. Body hair is medium to sparse. The face and head are large (long-medium-sized); long face. The nose is narrow and straight, with a high bridge. In the history of the formation of the race, depigmentation occurred.

White Sea-Baltic minor race. Distribution: from the Baltic to the White Seas. The lightest pigmented race, especially the hair. The body length is shorter than that of the Atlanto-Baltic minor race, the face is wider and lower. Shorter nose, often with a concave dorsum. This option is a direct descendant ancient population Central and Northern Europe.

Central European small race. The range is all of Europe, especially the North European Plain from the Atlantic to the Volga. The races are represented by Germans, Czechs, Slovaks, Poles, Austrians, Northern Italians, Ukrainians, Russians. Darker hair color than that of the White Sea-Baltic race. The head is moderately wide. Average face size. Beard growth is average to above average. The nose has a straight back and a high bridge, the length varies.

Balkan-Caucasian small race. The area is the Eurasian mountain belt. Body length is average and above average. The hair is dark, often wavy. The eyes are dark and mixed shades. Strong tertiary hairline. The head is brachycephalic (short). Face width is from average to above average. The nose is large, with a convex back. The base of the nose and the tip are drooping.

Indo-Mediterranean small race. Range - some southern regions of Europe, North Africa, Arabia, a number of southern regions of Eurasia to India. Represented by the Spaniards, Portuguese, southern Italians, Algerians, Libyans, Egyptians, Iranians, Iraqis, Afghans, peoples of Central Asia, Indians. Body length is average and below average. Skin color is dark. Hair is wavy. The eyes are dark. Tertiary hairline is moderate. The nose is straight and narrow, the bridge of the nose is high. The eyeball is wide open. The middle part of the face predominates. Fold upper eyelid poorly developed.

Laponoid small race. Range: northern Fennoscandia. The basis of the anthropological type of Lapps (Sami). In ancient times, widespread in northern Europe. Mixture of Caucasoid and Mongoloid characteristics. The skin is light, the hair is dark, straight or wide-wavy, soft. Eyes are dark or mixed shades. The tertiary hairline is weak. The head is large. The face is low. The nose is short and wide. The interorbital distance is wide. Body length is small. The legs are relatively short, the arms are long, and the body is wide.

Asian American race

Pacific Mongoloids.

Far Eastern small race. It is part of the population of Korea, China, and Japan. Skin color is dark. The eyes are dark. Epicanthus is common. The tertiary hairline is very weak. Height is average or above average. The face is narrow, of medium width, high, flat. High brain skull. The nose is long, with a straight back, slightly to medium prominent.

South Asian minor race. The skin color is darker than that of the Far Eastern race. In comparison, the epicanthus is less characteristic: the face is less flattened and lower; lips are thicker; the nose is relatively wider. The skull is small and wide. The forehead is convex. Body length is small. Range: countries of South and Southeast Asia.

Northern Mongoloids

North Asian small race. The skin color is lighter than that of the Pacific Mongoloids. The hair is dark and dark brown, straight and coarse. The face is tall and wide, very flat. Brain skull low. There is a very low nose bridge. Frequently epicanthus. The eye shape is small: Body length is average and below average. It is part of many indigenous peoples of Siberia (Evenks, Yakuts, Buryats).

Arctic small race. It is part of the Eskimos, Chukchi, American Indians, and Koryaks. The pigmentation is darker than that of the North Asian minor race; the face is more prognathic. Hair is straight and coarse. Epicanthus is found in 50% of the race. The nose is moderately prominent. Wide lower jaw. The bones and muscles are highly developed. The body and arms are short. The chest is rounded.

American race

The range is the vast territory of America. Large nose, sometimes convex. Facial flatness is moderate. Epicanthus is rare. The face and head are large. Massive body.

Australian-Negroid race

African Negroids

Negro minor race. Habitat: savannah and forest zone of Africa. Skin color is dark or very dark. Eye color is dark. The hair is very curly and spirally curled. The nose is wide in the wings. Low and flat nose bridge. The lips are thick. Severe alveolar prognathism. Tertiary hair coat is medium and weak. The palpebral fissure is wide open; the eyeball protrudes slightly forward. The interorbital distance is large. Body length is average or above average. The limbs are long, the body is short. The pelvis is small.

Bushman minor race. Habitat: desert and semi-desert areas South Africa. Yellowish-brown skin color. Hair and eyes are dark. The hair is spiral-curled and grows weakly in length. The nose is wide, with a low bridge. The tertiary cover is weak. The eye shape is smaller than that of the Negro race; epicanthus is found. The face is small, somewhat flattened. Small lower jaw. Body length is below average. Strong development fat on the buttocks. Wrinkling of the skin. The Bushmen are a remnant of the ancient race of Africa from the Old-Middle Stone Age.

Negril small race. Natives of the African rainforest. The pigmentation and shape of the hair is like that of the Bushmen. The nose is wider, but protrudes more strongly. The eye shape is significant, the eyeball protrudes greatly. The tertiary hairline is highly developed. The body length is very short, the legs are short, the arms are long. The joints are movable.

Oceanic Negroids

Australian minor race. Indigenous people of Australia. The skin color is dark, but lighter than that of the Negro race. Hair color ranges from brown to black. Hair shape - from wide-wavy to narrow-wavy and curly. The eyes are dark. Tertiary hair is well developed on the face and weakly on the body. The nose is very wide, low bridge. The eye shape is large; the position of the eyeball is deep. Lips of medium thickness. The jaws protrude forward. Body length is average and above average. The body is short, the limbs are long. The chest is powerful, the muscles are well developed, the neck is short. The skull, unlike the skeleton, is very massive.

Melanesian minor race. Distribution area: New Guinea and the islands of Melanesia. Unlike Australians, curly-haired people have shorter growth, and the tertiary hairline is less developed. Papuans often have a large nose with a convex back and a drooping tip (similar to the Western Asian Caucasians).

Veddoid small race. The race's habitat is the islands of Indonesia, Sri Lanka, and South India. It is a smaller version of the Australians. Moderately dark skin, wavy hair, medium lips, moderate jaw protrusion. The nose is narrower in the wings, the bridge of the nose is not too low. The tertiary hairline is weak. Body length is average and below average. Often this race is combined with the Australian into one. In ancient times, both options were widespread.

Contact races

At the junction of the ranges of large races, contact races are distinguished, having special classification. In the territory where Caucasians and Mongoloids are in contact, the Ural and South Siberian small races are distinguished; the mixing of Caucasians and Negroids gave rise to the Ethiopian small race; Caucasoids and Veddoids - a small Dravidian race.

Ural small race. Race area: Cis-Urals, Trans-Urals, part Western Siberia. The skin is light. The hair is dark and dark brown, straight and wide-wavy, often soft. Eye color - mixed and dark shades, a little light. The nose is straight or with a concave back, the tip is raised, the bridge of medium height. The face is small and relatively wide, low and moderately flattened. Lips of medium thickness. The tertiary hairline is weakened. The Ural race is similar to the Laponoid race, but people are larger and have Mongoloid admixture. The Ural race is represented by the Mansi, Khanty, Selkups, some Volga peoples, and some peoples of the Altai-Sayan Highlands.

South Siberian small race. The race's habitat is the steppes of Kazakhstan, the mountainous regions of the Tien Shan, Altai-Sayan Mountains. Skin color is dark and light. Hair and eye color, like the Ural race. The nose has a straight or convex back, large, the bridge of medium height. The face is quite high and wide. Hair is often straight and coarse. Average height. The variant is more massive than the Ural one. This race includes the Kazakhs and Kyrgyz.

Ethiopian minor race. Distributed in East Africa. Skin color - with brown tints. Hair and eye color is dark. The hair is curly and finely wavy. The tertiary cover is weakened. The nose is straight, with a fairly high bridge, and not wide. The face is narrow, lips are of medium thickness. Body length is average and above average; the body is narrow-built. The ancient version of humanity (from the Middle and New Stone Ages).

Dravidian (South Indian) small race. Distribution area: Southern India at the junction of southern Caucasoids and Veddoids. Brown skin. The hair is straight and wavy, the proportions of the face and its details tend to average values.

Ainu (Kuril) small race. The area is the island of Hokkaido. Skin color is dark. The hair is dark, coarse, wavy. The eyes are light brown. Epicanthus is rare or absent. The tertiary hairline is very well developed. The face is low, wide, slightly flattened. The nose, mouth and ears are large, the lips are full. The arms are long, the legs are relatively short. The physique is massive. The Ainu are sometimes considered a special large race; they are also classified as Caucasoids or Australoids.

Polynesian minor race. Range: Pacific Islands. New Zealand. The skin is dark, sometimes light or yellowish. Hair is dark, wavy or straight. Tertiary hair on the body is weak, on the face it is medium. The nose is not protruding, relatively wide. Lips are full. Large body size. The question remains unclear which great races were included as components of mixing in this variant.

The size of the population that forms the races. The total number of populations belonging to equatorial races (without transitional and mixed forms) is about 260.1 million people (calculations were carried out by S.I. Brook with the participation of N.N. Cheboksarov in 1975-1976). The Oceanian (Australoid) branch accounts for 9.5 million people. Among the Negroids, the most numerous are blacks (250.2 million people, 215 million people live in Africa, 35 million people live in America). There are about 200 thousand African Pygmies (Negrills), and 250 thousand Bushmen. The most numerous in South and Southeast Asia are the Veddoids - 5 million people, the Melanesians and Papuans - 4.26 million people. There are about 50 thousand Australians, about 20 thousand Ainu people.

The total number of populations transitional between the Equatorial and Caucasoid races is about 356.6 million people (South Indian group - 220 million people, Ethiopian group - 45 million people).

The total number of Caucasian populations, not mixed or very little mixed with other large races, reaches 1803.5 million people. Light Caucasians make up 140 million people, dark Caucasians make up 1047.5 million people, the rest are transitional types. IN former USSR Caucasians numbered 220 million people, in foreign Europe - 478 million, in Africa - 107 million, in America - 303 million, in Australia and Oceania - 16.5 million people. Light Caucasians predominate in northern Europe and North America, dark Caucasians predominate in the Caucasus, the Middle East, South Asia, southern Europe, Africa, and Latin America. Mixed and transitional forms between Caucasian and Asian Mongoloids number 44.8 million people. Thus, the South Siberian race numbers 8.5 million people, the Ural race - 13.1 million people.

The third main group of races - Mongoloid - is estimated at 712.3 million people. The Northern Mongoloids (continental) number 8 million people, the number of Pacific (Eastern) Mongoloids reaches 671.1 million people (the majority are in China and Korea). The Arctic (Eskimo) group of types numbers 150 thousand people (transitional between the continental and Pacific Mongoloids). The American Mongoloids (sometimes classified as a separate large race) include approximately 33 million people.

The number of mixed and transitional forms between Mongoloids and equatorial races can be judged by the South Asian contact race connecting the Eastern Mongoloids with the Australoids, which numbers 550.4 million people.

The Polynesian contact group numbers about 1 million people. It occupies a middle position between all the great races of humanity.

The size of all Mongoloid-equatorial populations is estimated at 674.1 million people.

The population of our planet today exceeds 7 billion people. This figure is increasing every day.

World population

Scientists have determined that in just a decade, the number of people on Earth will increase by 1 billion people. However, this dynamic demographic picture was not always so high.

Until a few centuries ago, the human population grew slowly. People died from unfavorable weather conditions and diseases at an early age, since the development of science and technology was at a low level.

Today, the largest countries in terms of population are Japan, China and India. The population of these three countries becomes half of the total world population.

The smallest number of people live in countries whose territory covers equatorial forests, tundra and taiga zones, as well as mountain ranges. The bulk of the planet's population lives in the Northern Hemisphere (about 90%).

Races

All humanity is divided into races. Races are organized groups of people who are united by common external characteristics - body structure, face shape, skin color, hair structure.

Such external signs were formed as a result of the adaptation of human physiology to environmental conditions. There are three major races: Caucasoid, Negroid and Mongoloid.

The most numerous is the Caucasian race, accounting for about 45% of the planet's population. Caucasians inhabit the territory of Europe, part of Asia, South and North America and Australia.

The second largest race is the Mongoloid race. The Mongoloid race includes people living in Asia, as well as aborigines North America- Indians.

The Negroid race ranks third in number. Representatives of this race live in Africa. After the slave period, representatives of the Negroid race remained to live in South and North America.

Peoples

Large races are formed by representatives of many nations. Most of the planet's population belongs to 20 major nations, their number exceeds 50 million people.

Nations are communities of people who have lived in the same territory for long periods of time. historical periods and are united by cultural heritage.

There are about 1,500 peoples in the modern world. The geography of their settlement is very diverse. Some of them are spread all over the planet, some live within a populated area.

Man represents one biological species, but why are we all so different? It's all due to different subspecies, that is, races. How many of them exist and what mixed ones are, let’s try to figure it out further.

Concept of race

The human race is a group of people who share a number of similar traits that are inherited. The concept of race gave impetus to the movement of racism, which is based on the belief in the genetic differences of representatives of races, the mental and physical superiority of some races over others.

Research in the 20th century showed that it is impossible to distinguish them genetically. Most of the differences appear externally, and their diversity can be explained by the characteristics of the habitat. For example, white skin promotes better absorption of vitamin D, and it appeared as a result of a lack of daylight.

IN Lately scientists more often support the opinion that this term is irrelevant. Man is a complex creature; his formation is influenced not only by climatic and geographical factors, which largely determine the concept of race, but also by cultural, social and political ones. The latter contributed to the emergence of mixed and transitional races, further blurring all boundaries.

Big races

Despite the general vagueness of the concept, scientists are still trying to figure out why we are all so different. There are many classification concepts. They all agree that man is a single biological species, Homo sapiens, which is represented by various subspecies or populations.

Options for differentiation range from two independent races to fifteen, not to mention many subraces. Most often in the scientific literature they talk about the existence of three or four large races, which include small ones. Thus, according to external characteristics, they distinguish the Caucasian type, Mongoloid, Negroid, and also Australoid.

Caucasians are divided into northern - with blond hair and skin, gray or blue eyes, and southern ones - with dark skin, dark hair, brown eyes. They are characterized by narrow eyes, prominent cheekbones, coarse straight hair, and little body hair.

The Australoid race was long considered Negroid, but it turned out that they have differences. In terms of characteristics, the Veddoid and Melanesian races are much closer to it. Australoids and Negroids have dark skin and dark eye color. Although some Australoids may have light skin. They differ from Negroids in having abundant hair, as well as less wavy hair.

Minor and mixed races

Large races are too strong a generalization, because the differences between people are more subtle. Therefore, each of them is divided into several anthropological types, or small races. They are isolated great amount. For example, it includes the Negro, Khoisai, Ethiopian, and Pygmy types.

The term "mixed races" more often refers to populations of people that arose as a result of recent (since the 16th century) contacts of large races. These include mestizo, sambo, and mulatto.

Métis

In anthropology, mestizos are all descendants of marriages of people belonging to different races, regardless of which ones. The process itself is called crossbreeding. History knows many cases where representatives of mixed races were discriminated against, humiliated and even exterminated during Nazi policies in Germany, apartheid in South Africa and other movements.

In many countries, the descendants of specific races are also called mestizos. In America, they are the children of Indians and Caucasians, and in this meaning the term came to us. They are mainly distributed in South and North America.

The number of Métis in Canada, in the narrow sense of the term, is 500-700 thousand people. Active mixing of blood took place here during colonization, mainly European men entered into relationships with Separated, mestizos formed a separate ethnic group, speaking Mythic (a complex mixture of French and Cree).

Mulattos

The descendants of Negroids and Caucasians are mulattoes. Their skin is light black, which is what the name of the term conveys. The name first appeared around the 16th century, coming into Spanish or Portuguese from Arabic. The word muwallad used to be used to describe non-purebred Arabs.

In Africa, mulattoes live mainly in Namibia and South Africa. Quite a large number of them live in the Caribbean region and Latin American countries. In Brazil they make up almost 40% of the total population, in Cuba - more than half. A significant number live in the Dominican Republic - more than 75% of the population.

Mixed races used to have other names, depending on the generation and the proportion of Negroid genetic material. If Caucasian blood was classified as ¼ of Negroid blood (mulatto in the second generation), then the person was called a quadroon. The ratio of 1/8 was called octon, 7/8 - marabou, 3/4 - griff.

Sambo

The genetic mixture of Negroids and Indians is called Sambo. In Spanish the term is zambo. As with other mixed races, the term changed its meaning periodically. Previously, the name Sambo meant marriages between representatives of the Negroid race and mulattoes.

Sambo first appeared in South America. The Indians represented the indigenous population of the mainland, and blacks were brought as slaves to work on sugar cane plantations. Slaves were brought from the beginning of the 16th century until late XIX. During this period, approximately 3 million people were transported from Africa.

Shatova Polina

Human races

The modern racial appearance of humanity was formed as a result of the complex historical development of racial groups that lived separately and mixed, evolved, and disappeared. It is of particular importance to us to study all that we can learn about the human races in order to understand what really defines the human race. Even without outside help, by observing, you can see that people in the world are divided into different groups. The members of each are in some way more closely related to each other than to the members of the other group. For this reason, they are more similar to each other than to the others.

The section of anthropology - racial studies - summarizes data on the study of the anthropological composition of the peoples of the globe in the present and past, that is, on the formation and distribution of races on Earth; examines the problems of classification of races, their origin, settlement by to the globe, development and interaction in connection with the specific history of human populations, drawing on data from morphology and physiology, genetics and molecular biology. The main problems of this section are the history of the formation of races, the relationship between them on different stages historical development, revealing the causes and mechanisms of racial differentiation.

A large place in racial studies is occupied by the study of demarcating racial characteristics, their heredity, dependence on the surrounding natural-geographical and socio-cultural environment, gender differences, age dynamics, geographical variations and epochal changes. Racial studies data are used to refute pseudoscientific racist concepts and form a correct idea of ​​the differences in the morphological appearance of people.

The origin of the term "race" is not precisely established. It is possible that it is a modification of the Arabic word “ras” (head, beginning, root). There is also an opinion that this term is associated with the Italian razza, which means “tribe”. The word “race” in approximately the sense in which it is used now is found already in the French scientist Francois Bernier, who published one of the first classifications of human races in 1684.
Races exist primarily in a social sense and represent a form of social classification that is used in a particular society. However, in a biological sense, there is no clear division into races. Anthropology does not deny the existence of distinct morphological and genetic diversity in humanity. Different researchers in different periods meant different concepts by “race”.

Races are historically established groupings (population groups) of people of different numbers, characterized by similarities in morphological and physiological properties, as well as the commonality of the territories they occupy.

Large races of man

Since the 17th century, a lot has been proposed various classifications human races Most often, three main, or large, races are distinguished: Caucasian (Eurasian, Caucasian), Mongoloid (Asian-American) and Equatorial (Negro-Australoid). The Caucasian race is characterized by fair skin (with variations from very light, mainly in Northern Europe, to dark and even brown), soft straight or wavy hair, horizontal eye shape, moderately or strongly developed hair on the face and chest in men, noticeably protruding nose, straight or slightly sloping forehead.

Representatives of the Mongoloid race have skin color ranging from dark to light (mainly among North Asian groups), hair is usually dark, often coarse and straight, the protrusion of the nose is usually small, the palpebral fissure has an oblique cut, the fold of the upper eyelid is significantly developed and, in addition, In addition, there is a fold (epicanthus) covering the inner corner of the eye; the hairline is weak.

The equatorial race is distinguished by dark pigmentation of the skin, hair and eyes, curly or wide-wavy (Australian) hair; the nose is usually wide, slightly protruding, the lower part of the face protrudes.

Small races and their geographical distribution

Each large race is divided into small races, or anthropological types. Within the Caucasoid race, the Atlanto-Baltic, White Sea-Baltic, Central European, Balkan-Caucasian and Indo-Mediterranean minor races are distinguished. Nowadays, Caucasians inhabit virtually all inhabited land, but until the mid-15th century - the beginning of the great geographical discoveries - their main range included Europe, North Africa, Western and Central Asia and India. In modern Europe, all minor races are represented, but the Central European variant predominates numerically (often found among Austrians, Germans, Czechs, Slovaks, Poles, Russians, Ukrainians); in general, its population is very mixed, especially in cities, due to relocations, miscegenation and the influx of migrants from other regions of the Earth.

Within the Mongoloid race, the Far Eastern, South Asian, North Asian, Arctic and American small races are usually distinguished, and the latter is sometimes considered as a separate large race. The Mongoloids populated all climatic and geographical zones (North, Central, East and Southeast Asia, the Pacific Islands, Madagascar, North and South America). Modern Asia is characterized by a wide variety of anthropological types, but various Mongoloid and Caucasian groups predominate in numbers. Among the Mongoloids, the most common are the Far Eastern (Chinese, Japanese, Koreans) and South Asian (Malays, Javanese, Sundae) minor races, and among the Caucasians - the Indo-Mediterranean. In America, the indigenous population (Indians) is a minority compared to various Caucasian anthropological types and population groups of representatives of all three major races.

The equatorial, or Negro-Australoid, race includes three small races of African Negroids (Negro, or Negroid, Bushman and Negrillian) and the same number of Oceanic Australoids (Australian, or Australoid, race, which in some classifications is distinguished as an independent large race, as well as the Melanesian and Veddoid). The range of the equatorial race is not continuous: it covers most Africa, Australia, Melanesia, New Guinea, partly Indonesia. In Africa, the Negro small race predominates numerically; in the north and south of the continent there is a significant specific gravity Caucasian population.
In Australia, the indigenous population is a minority compared to migrants from Europe and India; representatives of the Far Eastern race (Japanese, Chinese) are also quite numerous. In Indonesia, the South Asian race predominates.

Along with the above, there are races with a less definite position, formed as a result of long-term mixing of the population of individual regions, for example, the Lapanoid and Ural races, combining the features of Caucasoids and Mongoloids, or the Ethiopian race - intermediate between the Equatorial and Caucasian races.

Race and psyche

For a long time, sharp mental differences have been incorrectly attributed to the races. The famous Swedish naturalist Carl Linnaeus (1707-1778) was the first scientist to propose a more or less scientific classification of human races according to their physical features, but at the same time it was in vain to attribute, for example, to the “Asian man” cruelty, melancholy, stubbornness and stinginess; “African” - anger, cunning, laziness, indifference; “European” - mobility, wit, ingenuity, i.e. high mental abilities. Thus, Linnaeus exalted the “white” race over others.

Darwin, unlike Linnaeus, recognized the existence of fundamental similarities in the manifestations of higher nervous activity in people of different races.
Darwin was very far from explaining the low cultural level of the Fuegians by their mental racial characteristics. On the contrary, he sought an explanation for this in factors of a social nature.

Speaking about the expression of emotions, or mental experiences, with the help of facial muscles, Darwin comes to the conclusion that among representatives of different races the similarity or identity in this regard is striking.
Elsewhere, Darwin draws attention to the fact of extraordinary similarity in the forms and methods of producing stone tips for weapons, collected from the most diverse countries of the earth and dating back to the ancient eras of mankind. He explains this by the similarity of inventive and mental abilities among the most diverse human races even in past times.

They often try to justify the opinion about the natural fundamental differences in the psyche of different races by the fact that the weight of the brain in different racial groups fluctuates within several hundred grams. However, a person's abilities cannot be judged by the weight of his brain.

Outstanding people come from a wide variety of races. Mao Tse-tung is the greatest statesman of the new China, where the people of six hundred million, having overthrown the yoke of foreign imperialist invaders and completely freed themselves from the yoke of feudalism, are busy peacefully building a new, happy life. The world-famous singer Paul Robeson is a prominent peace fighter, laureate of the Stalin Prize “For Strengthening Peace Between Nations.” There are many similar examples that can be given.

Reactionary bourgeois scientists, with the help of special psychotechnical tests, so-called tests, strive to show the alleged mental superiority of one race over another. Such attempts have been made more than once and, moreover, without taking into account the difference in social status, in the education and upbringing received among the groups being examined and compared with each other. Genuine scientists, understandably, have a sharply negative attitude towards these toasts, as tools unsuitable for determining psychic abilities.

Some reactionary German anthropologists tried to prove the existence and inheritance of mental racial traits in their reports and speeches at the International Congress on Anthropology and Ethnography, held in Copenhagen in August 1938. In their preaching of racism, they went so far as to claim that Australians are because of “bad racial psyche" have almost died out, while the Maoris from the island of New Zealand successfully perceive European culture, since, according to these anthropologists, they belong to the Caucasian race.

At the same congress, however, strong objections were heard from a number of its more progressive members. They denied the presence of natural racial traits in the psyche and pointed to differences in the level of culture, which are reflected in the mental makeup of tribes and peoples. Scientific evidence is inconsistent. with allegations of the existence of a special “racial instinct”, which supposedly causes enmity between the races of mankind. Under favorable social conditions, peoples of any racial composition can create an advanced culture and civilization. The psyche of individual people, their national character, behavior are determined and formed under the predominant, decisive influence social environment: racial characteristics do not play any role in the development of mental activity.

The outstanding Russian ethnographer and anthropologist Nikolai Nikolaevich Miklouho-Maclay set one of the chains of his research on the uncultured peoples of Oceania to determine the level of their natural intelligence. Having spent many years in friendly relations with the Papuans, he met many bright facts, confirming that these inhabitants of New Guinea have the same high mental characteristics as Europeans. For example, when Miklouho-Maclay was drawing a map of the area in which he lived, a Papuan who was observing his work and did not know the map before immediately discovered an error made when drawing the coastline and very accurately corrected it.
Miklouho-Maclay characterizes the Papuans as reasonable and not devoid of artistic taste people who skillfully carve figurines of their ancestors and make various ornaments.

As a result of many years of anthropological and ethnographic research, which made the works of Miklouho-Maclay classic, he irrefutably proved that the Papuans are quite capable of limitless cultural development. In this respect, they are in no way inferior to the Europeans.
Miklouho-Maclay's research revealed the unscientific and biased views of racists about the natural inability of dark-skinned races to creatively master the spiritual wealth accumulated by humanity.

All my short life Miklouho-Maclay devoted himself to the struggle for the idea of ​​the biological equivalence of human races. He considered people of all races to be fully capable of the highest achievements in the field of culture. Principles of progressive scientific and social activities Miklouho-Maclay developed at a time when the revolutionary democratic views of the greatest Russian thinker Nikolai Gavrilovich Chernyshevsky, who was especially interested in questions about human races, were being formed. Chernyshevsky, focusing his attention on the features of racial differences and similarities, denied the claims of racists about the physical and mental inequality of human races. He rejected the influence of race on historical development and, using the example of black slavery in the United States, revealed the reactionary essence of racism. Chernyshevsky based his views on race and racism on solid scientific evidence. Among the latter, he especially highly valued the achievements of physiology. nervous system, clearly visible in Russian science thanks to the brilliant works of Ivan Mikhailovich Sechenov.

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RACES OF HUMAN We humans differ from each other in eye color, hair color, skin tone, height, body weight, facial features. These are all individual differences. But there are signs that distinguish entire communities of people - races. Race is a historically established group of people united by: - ​​a common origin; - territory of residence; - general morphological and physiological - hereditary characteristics; - traditions and customs. Francois Bernier
The question of the origin and classification of races has a long history. First attempt to describe human races made in the 17th century. Frenchman Bernier. Carl Linnaeus
Later, K. Linnaeus identified four races: American, European, Asian, African. Currently, most scientists distinguish three large races and several dozen small ones. Large races - Equatorial (Australian-Negroid), Eurasian (Caucasoid), Asian-American (Mongoloid). Representatives of the equatorial race live mainly in some tropical regions of the Old World. They are characterized by dark skin, wavy or curly hair, a wide flattened nose with big nostrils, thick lips. The area of ​​distribution of the Eurasian race is Europe, part of Asia, North Africa, America. Its representatives are characterized by light, sometimes dark skin, straight, sometimes wavy soft hair, a long nose, thin lips, and usually well-developed facial hair (mustache, beard). The Asian-American race is common in America, Central and East Asia. Representatives of this race have straight, black, coarse hair, and their mustache and beard grow weakly. The skin is more dark than light. The Mongols have a nose of medium width and protrudes slightly, while the American Indians have a long, strongly protruding nose. Most characteristic features This race has a wide face, prominent cheekbones, a narrow palpebral fissure, medium-thick lips, and an upper eyelid covered by a leathery fold (“third eyelid”). However, even within the same race there are groups of people who differ from each other. For example, a Malay is not very similar in appearance to a Buryat or an Evenk. The Negroid pygmies from the banks of the Congo River differ from the Bushmen of the Kalahari Desert. Caucasians of Northern Europe (Norwegians, Swedes) - light-eyed, fair-haired, light-skinned - bear little resemblance to southerners, most of whom are brown-eyed and dark-skinned. Therefore, scientists identify several dozen smaller races - second and third order. Currently, people are actively moving around the world, moving from place to place. Representatives of different races marry. Races arose a long time ago. The first division into two large trunks, the Mongoloid and Caucasian-Negroid races, occurred 90-92 thousand years ago. It is believed that the separation of Caucasians and Negroids occurred 50 thousand years ago. Scientists are still arguing about the mechanism of race formation. Many characteristics of races are clearly adaptive in nature. Thus, the dark skin of Negroids protects them better from ultraviolet rays than the light skin of Caucasians. Curly hair serves as a good heat insulator in the sun. An important factor in the formation of races could become their isolation. In groups of people living isolated from the rest of the world, certain new characteristics arose - the shape of the nose, lips, etc. People - carriers of this trait married only within their group. Their offspring also married within this group. Over time, the new trait became the property of all members of this group. Despite the differences between races, all modern humanity is represented by one species - Homo sapiens. Races should not be confused with the concepts of “nation” and “people.” Representatives of different races can be members of a single state and speak the same language. The presence of speech centers is a biological feature human species. What language a person speaks depends not on his belonging to one or another race or nationality, but on social factors - on who the person lives with and who will teach him. Through speech, the ability to control one’s behavior is realized: an adult, mature, intelligent person first sets goals, plans his actions, and only then acts.