If race is just "skin deep", then why can anthropologists determine race from a skull?

Question

If race is just "skin deep", then why can anthropologists determine race from a skull?

Answer 1

It isn't just skin deep. "Race" is a set of physical characteristics, including bone and tooth structure.

Answer 2

There are slight variations in populations that have been separated for tens of thousands of years.  You can tell if a skull is likely to belong to a certain population but it isn't always a certainty. The amount of melanin is determined by small changes in a few genes.  Skin color doesn't determine race and is purely a relic of racism and ignorance.

Answer 3

race is just skin deep isn't said to be scientifically correct, its just a way of saying that no matter our skin color, we are all humans and equal.

although it isn't true because white and black people act differently.

and if you posted this to just be sarcastic, well, then, i thought it was funny...

Answer 4

Because race isn't just skin deep......there are minor variations to our phenotypes......What people mean when they say "skin deep" is that we're all basically the same, and we shouldn't squabble about race.......hope this helps

Answer 5

your question on the face of it makes it appear that you're prejudice and am looking for an excuse to "prove" that some races are "less than"you.  If this is you, then we have little use for you.  I challenge you to see every aspect of those other races as manifestations of yourself and  your very profound faults; or maybe what you see in others is what you see in yourself because of low self-esteem.  Wake up silly; you're dangerous.  Do you want to be dangerous?  If not, then, take a close look at yourself, and get some help.

JB  you're incorrect: anthropologists can tell race apart by skulls, but your other sentences were perfect   loveya man

Answer 6

We are a human race, however other demographics, such as the where one originated, maybe able to be determined though physical facial features of a skull.

Answer 7

Thanks for the question. Wanted to ask this for a long time.

Answer 8

Because physically the bodies of different races are different, however our minds, emotions, intelligence, ect are not different based on race.

Answer 9

Your statement is only half true. Anthropologists can tell race from skulls, but they cannot do so with 100% certainty. The best an anthropologist or good osteologist can do is make an estimation. Even though they may often be right, that's a loooooong way from being right all the time. The science is not exact, which says a lot, consequently, about the "science" of race.

Answer 10

While "skin deep" is a common cliche, there are scientific techniques that provide information about a person.

A good deal of information can be determined from human bones. There's:"what forensic anthropologists call “doing the big four”—identifying age, s*x, race, and stature. "

http://main.uab.edu/show.asp?durki=45647

"Age, says Wheatley, is determined in a young person by the length of the bones, the extent of fusion of the epiphysis (the caps on the ends of long bones that fuse completely with the bones after the age of 20), and the status of the teeth, which anthropologists refer to as dental eruptions."

Gender can be readily identified by examining the pubis bone, which is elongated in women to allow for childbirth—although the skull, too, is a good indicator, Wheatley points out. “It’s true that men have big heads,” he laughs. “Females are usually smaller and more delicate. You can get an 85- or 90-percent probability on s*x from the skull.” In fact, Wheatley usually begins his examination with the skull, because so much can be determined from it.

Race is a much more complex issue. And it’s getting more complex all the time, Wheatley says. “Just walking around the UAB campus, I see so many signs of increased racial mixing,” he says. “For example, every day on the street I see white students with high cheekbones”—a sure sign, he says, that the races are becoming less and less distinct as the planet’s population moves toward a multiracial citizenry.

For that reason, racial identification these days is kept to the basics—white, black, Asian, or Native American, based on distinctive characteristics of the skeleton, regardless of what the person’s skin may have looked like."

http://main.uab.edu/show.asp?durki=45647

There's also this source:

"RACE DETERMINATION FROM BONES

The skull is the only reliable bone. It is not possible to narrow down the identification to racial

stock:

• Caucasian (all whites)

• ***** (all blacks - African, American Negroes and West Indians)

• Mongoloid (Chinese, Japanese, American Indians)

Thus skulls of British, Germans, French or Swedes cannot be distinguished from one another.

Similarly Japanese skulls are similar to Chinese skulls.

Mongoloid race has characteristically "shovel-shaped" concave upper incisor teeth.

Cheekbones (Zygomatic arches): determine facial width. More prominent in Mongoloids. Width

between eyes greater in mongoloids.

Nasal openings: Wider and flatter in Negroids. Narrow in Caucasians.

Femur: Tends to be straighter in Negroids."

http://www.dundee.ac.uk/forensicmedicine...

While bones give information, the same is not true with blood group data. Based on that there's only one race.

Answer 11

Actually there are several racial differences that are more than skin deep.  That's just the way it is.  It's neither good nor bad.

Answer 12

Anthropologists work on the assumption that all men are equal and belong to the one race. They cannot determine one type of skull from another. Only people who know nothing about Anthropology and have a multiple race issue, and of course, those people who are colour prejudiced will argue the point..

Answer 13

variations in size and structure of individual skull bones  and the teeth can help to identify the race of an unknown skull.