The color brown as a metaphor for race can be traced to Johann Blumenbach On the basis of his craniometrical research (analysis of human skulls), he divided the human species into five races: the Caucasian or white race, the Orientals or yellow, the Malayan or brown race, the African, or black race, and the American Indians or red race. The brown race was for Polynesisians and Melanesians of Pacific Islands, and for aborigines of Australia.[1] According to Dinesh D'Souza, "Blumenbach's classification had a lasting influence in part because his categories neatly broke down into the familiar colors: white, black, yellow, red, and brown."[2] Gradually the "yellow" and "red" races got lumped together, and the brown race ignored because of its small population, yielding just three races commonly known as mongoloid, caucasoid, and negroid[3]. The last term is derived from Negro which is a Spanish adjective for black.[4] Some anthropologists added the brown race back in as an Australoid category (which includes aboriginal peoples of Australia along with various peoples of southeast Asia, especially Melanesia and the Malay Archipelago)[5], and viewed it as separate from negroids (often lumping Australoids in with caucasoids) despite the fact that their skin is also dark.[6]

Black as a skin color identity

Black people (ethncity)

  1. ^ The Mismeasure of Man by Stephen Jay Gould, pg 402, 1996
  2. ^ The End of Racism by Dinesh D'Souza, pg 124, 1995
  3. ^ [[1]]
  4. ^ [[ http://72.14.205.104/search?q=cache:lDEuCwny0QIJ:www.codesria.org/Links/Publications/bulletin1 04/keita.pdf++Black+webster+Negro+equivalent+sets&hl=en&gl=ca&ct=clnk&cd=1]]
  5. ^ [[ http://education.yahoo.com/reference/dictionary/entry/Australoid]]
  6. ^ [[ http://apologeticspress.org/articles/2007]]