N THIS paper I desire to examine the concepts of race as they are used I with reference to man. I shall first deal with the use of this term by biologists and anthropologists, and then with its use by the man-on-the-street, the socalled layman-so-called, no doubt, from the lines in Sir Philip Sidney's sonnet: I shall endeavor to show that all those who continue to use the term "race" with reference to man, whether they be laymen or scientists, are "for sacred rites unfit.'' Once more, I shall, as irritatingly as the sound of a clanging door heard in the distance in a wind that will not be shut out, raise the question as to whether, with reference to man, it would not be better if the term "race" were altogether abandoned.At the outset it should, perhaps, be made clear that I believe, with most biologists, that evolutionary factors, similar to those that have been operative in producing raciation in other animal species, have also been operative in the human species-but with a significant added difference, namely, the consequences which have resulted from man's entry into that unique zone of adaptation in which he excels beyond all other creatures, namely culture, that is to say, the man-made part of the environment.On the evidence it would seem clear that man's cultural activities have introduced elements into the processes of human raciation which have so substantially modified the end-products that one can no longer equate the processes of raciation in lower animals with those which have occurred in the evolution of man. The factors of mutation, natural selection, drift, isolation, have all been operative in the evolution of man. But so have such factors as ever-increasing degrees of mobility, hybridization, and social selection, and it is the effects of these and similar factors which, a t least so it has always seemed to me, makes the employment of the term "race" inapplicable to most human populations as we find them today.Of course there exist differences, but we want a term by which to describe the existence of these differences. We do not want a prejudiced term which injects meanings which are not there into the differences. We want a term which as nearly mirrors the conditions as a term can, not one which falsifies and obfuscates the issue. 919
To the inarticulateness of nature man has added a new dimension-speech. He is the only creature who talks, in the sense of using a shared set of abstract rules for creating and communicating ideas about the world. Hence, it has more than once been suggested that, instead of being called by that oafishly arrogant, prematurely self-bestowed name Homo sapiens, he would be more accurately described as Homo loquens.In this paper, which is in two parts, I shall be concerned first with a brief inquiry into some of the factors that may have contributed to the origin and development of speech, and second, with a discussion of the importance of the study of prehistoric tools as a means of learning something about the behavior of early man.Let me begin, then, by saying that there exists a widespread belief among those of us who should know better that the tools of the early Oldowans were of the simplest kind, typically represented by the unifacial and bifacial choppers that one sees almost exclusively illustrated in books-mine, I regret to say, among them-on prehistoric man. Indeed, for a long time this is the only type of tool I believed had been found at the oldest Olduvai levels. Illustrations should present assemblages of the tools found, nor figures of a single allegedly "typical" implement. Otherwise, it is easy to fall victim to the imprinting of the "typical pebble tool" solecism. I t is easy enough to point to the mistakes of others; what is more difficult is for us to digest the unpalatable truth that such mistakes are equaled only by those we ourselves commit. In that spirit may 1 then, as uncaptiously as possible, note that in the proceedings of a recently published conference on the origin and evolution of language and speech we find one of the contributors stating that "The first tools, which are associated with the australopithecines and Homo hahilis. are either unshaped stones or stones that have a flake or two taken off them."' Curiously, in his references the author lists Mary Leakey's superb description of the tools and other artifacts found in Beds I and I1 at Olduvai.? That work shows the early Oldowans used quite a variety of skillfully made tools, not only of stone but also some of bone. There was evidence also of several other interesting artifacts.The tools from Bed I (site DK I A ) are typical Oldowan and are made from two kinds of lava, also from chert and tuff, and consist of five types of choppers, polyhedrons, discoids. light duty scrapers, and burins, as well as other varieties of heavy duty tools. In addition, artificially flaked and abraded bone tools were also recovered. It was at this level also that the remains were found of a loosely piled circle of stones suggestive of an artificial structure. No primate fossil remains have been found at this level, but the tools suggest use in cutting, pounding, scraping, and the butchering of small animals.Whoever made these tools must not only have been able to select the appropriate materials-bone, various kinds of stone, and possibly wood-but also...
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