Part 8
In the study of the behavior of members of foreign races educated in European society, we should also bear in mind the influence of habits of thought, feeling, and action acquired in early childhood, and of which no recollection is retained. If S. Freud is right in assuming that these forgotten incidents remain a living force throughout life,—the more potent, the more thoroughly they are forgotten,—we should have to conclude that many of the small traits of individuals which we ordinarily believe to be inherited are acquired by the influence of the individuals among whom the child spends the first five years of its life. All observations on the force of habit and the intensity of resistance to changes of habit are in favor of this theory.
Our brief consideration of some of the mental activities of man in civilized and in primitive society has led us to the conclusion that these functions of the human mind are common to the whole of humanity. It may be well to state here, that, according to our present method of considering biological and psychological phenomena, we must assume that these have developed from lower conditions existing at a previous time, and that at one time there certainly must have been races and tribes in which the properties here described were not at all, or only slightly, developed; but it is also true that among the present races of man, no matter how primitive they may be in comparison with ourselves, these faculties are highly developed.
It is not impossible that the degree of development of these functions may differ somewhat among different types of man; but I do not believe that we are able at the present time to form a just valuation of the hereditary mental powers of the different races. A comparison of their languages, customs, and activities suggests that their faculties may be unequally developed; but the differences are not sufficient to justify us to ascribe materially lower stages to some peoples, and higher stages to others. The conclusions reached from these considerations are therefore, on the whole, negative. We are not inclined to consider the mental organization of different races of man as differing in fundamental points. Although, therefore, the distribution of faculty among the races of man is far from being known, we can say this much: the average faculty of the white race is found to the same degree in a large proportion of individuals of all other races, and, although it is probable that some of these races may not produce as large a proportion of great men as our own race, there is no reason to suppose that they are unable to reach the level of civilization represented by the bulk of our own people.
V. RACE AND LANGUAGE
IN the last chapter I tried to show that the principal characteristics of the mind of primitive man occur among primitive tribes of all races, and that therefore the inference must not be drawn that these traits of the mind are racial characteristics. This negative conclusion, which is based entirely on the consideration of a few selected points that occur with great regularity in the description of primitive tribes, does not give us, however, proof positive of the lack of all correlation between mental life and racial descent, and we must direct our attention to those cases in which an immediate relationship between the two may be and has been claimed.
This has occurred particularly in regard to language and racial types. Indeed, the opinion is still held by some investigators that linguistic relationships and racial relationships are in a way interchangeable terms. An example illustrating this point of view may be seen in the long-continued discussions of the home of the “Aryan race,” in which the blond northwest European type is identified with the ancient people among whom the Indo-European or Aryan languages developed.
If it could be shown that distinct languages belong to distinct racial types, and that these languages exhibit different levels of development or indicate different types of thought, we should have gained a sound basis which would allow us to discuss the genius of each people as reflected in its language. If, furthermore, we could show that certain cultural types belong to certain races and are foreign to the genius of others, our conclusions would be founded on much firmer ground.
Thus we are led to a consideration of the all-important question whether types, languages, and cultures are so intimately connected that each human race is characterized by a certain combination of physical type, language, and culture.
It is obvious, that, if this correlation should exist in a strict sense, attempts to classify mankind from any one of the three points of view would necessarily lead to the same results; in other words, each point of view could be used independently or in combination with the other ones, to study the relations between the different groups of mankind. As a matter of fact, attempts of this kind have often been made. A number of classifications of the races of man are based wholly on anatomical characteristics, yet often combined with geographical considerations; others are based on the discussion of a combination of anatomical and cultural traits which are considered as characteristic of certain groups of mankind; while still others are based primarily on the study of the languages spoken by people representing a certain anatomical type.
The attempts that have thus been made have led to entirely different results (Topinard). Blumenbach, one of the first scientists who attempted to classify mankind, distinguished five races,—the Caucasian, Mongolian, Ethiopian, American, and Malay. It is fairly clear that this classification is based as much on geographical as on anatomical considerations, although the description of each race is primarily an anatomical one. Cuvier distinguished three races,—the white, yellow, and black. Huxley proceeded more strictly on a biological basis. He combined part of the Mongolian and American races of Blumenbach into one, assigned part of the South Asiatic peoples to the Australian type, and subdivided the European race into a dark and a light division. The numerical preponderance of the European types evidently led him to make finer distinctions in this race, which he divided into the xanthochroic or blond, and melanochroic or dark races. It would be easy to make subdivisions of equal value in other races. Still clearer is the influence of cultural points of view in classifications like those of Gobineau and of Klemm, the latter of whom distinguished the active and passive races according to the cultural achievements of the various types of man.
The most typical attempt to classify mankind from a consideration of both anatomical and linguistic points of view is that of Friedrich Müller, who takes as the basis of his primary divisions the form of hair, while all the minor divisions are based on linguistic considerations.
An attempt to correlate the numerous classifications that have been proposed shows clearly a condition of utter confusion and contradiction; so that we are led to the conclusion that type, language, and type of culture, may not be closely and permanently connected. We must therefore consider the actual development of these various traits among the existing races.
At the present period we may observe many cases in which a complete change of language and culture takes place without a corresponding change in physical type. This is true, for instance, among the North American negroes, a people by descent largely African; in culture and language, however, essentially European. While it is true that certain survivals of African culture and language are found among our American negroes, their culture is essentially that of the uneducated classes of the people among whom they live, and their language is on the whole identical with that of their neighbors,—English, French, Spanish, and Portuguese, according to the prevalent language in various parts of the continent. It might be objected that the transportation of the African race to America was an artificial one, and that in earlier times extended migrations and transplantations of this kind have not taken place.
The history of mediæval Europe, however, demonstrates that extended changes in language and culture have taken place many times without corresponding changes in blood.
Recent investigations of the physical types of Europe have shown with great clearness that the distribution of types has remained the same for a long period. Without considering details, it may be said that an Alpine type can easily be distinguished from a North European type on the one hand, and a South European type on the other (Ripley). The Alpine type appears fairly uniform over a large territory, no matter what language may be spoken and what national culture may prevail in the particular district. The Central European Frenchmen, Germans, Italians, and Slavs are so nearly of the same type, that we may safely assume a considerable degree of blood-relationship, notwithstanding their linguistic differences.
Instances of similar kind, in which we find permanence of blood with far-reaching modifications of language and culture, are found in other parts of the world. As an example may be mentioned the Veddah of Ceylon, a people fundamentally different in type from the neighboring Singhalese, whose language they seem to have adopted, and from whom they have also evidently borrowed a number of cultural traits (Sarasin). Still other examples are the Japanese of the northern part of Japan, who are undoubtedly, to a considerable extent, Ainu in blood (Bälz); and the Yukaghir of Siberia, who, while retaining to a great extent the old blood, have been assimilated in culture and language by the neighboring Tungus (Jochelson).
While it is therefore evident that in many cases a people, without undergoing a considerable change in type by mixture, has changed completely its language and culture, still other cases may be adduced in which it can be shown that a people has retained its language while undergoing material changes in blood and culture, or in both. As an example of this may be mentioned the Magyar of Europe, who have retained their old language, but have become mixed with people speaking Indo-European languages, and who have, to all intents and purposes, adopted European culture.
Similar conditions must have prevailed among the Athapascans, one of the great linguistic families of North America. The great body of people speaking languages belonging to this linguistic stock live in the northwestern part of America, while other dialects are spoken by small tribes in California, and still others by a large body of people in Arizona and New Mexico.[3] The relationship between all these dialects is so close that they must be considered as branches of one large group, and it must be assumed that all of them have sprung from a language once spoken over a continuous area. At the present time the people speaking these languages differ fundamentally in type, the inhabitants of the Mackenzie River region being quite different from the tribes of California, and these, again, differing from the tribes of New Mexico (Boas). The forms of culture in these different regions are also quite distinct: the culture of the California Athapascans resembles that of other Californian tribes, while the culture of the Athapascans of New Mexico and Arizona is influenced by that of other peoples of that area (Goddard). It seems most plausible to assume in this case that branches of this stock migrated from one part of this large area to another, where they intermingled with the neighboring people, and thus changed their physical characteristics, while at the same time they retained their speech. Without historical evidence, this process cannot, of course, be proved.
These two phenomena,—retention of type with change of language, and retention of language with change of type,—apparently opposed to each other, are still very closely related, and in many cases go hand in hand. An example of this is, for instance, the distribution of the Arabs along the north coast of Africa. On the whole, the Arab element has retained its language; but at the same time intermarriages with the native races were common, so that the descendants of the Arabs have often retained their old language, and have changed their type. On the other hand, the natives have to a certain extent given up their own languages, but have continued to intermarry among themselves, and have thus preserved their type. So far as any change of this kind is connected with intermixture, both types of changes must always occur at the same time, and will be classed as a change of type or a change of language, as our attention is directed to the one people or the other, or, in some cases, as the one or the other change is more pronounced. Cases of complete assimilation without any mixture of the people involved seem to be rare, if not entirely absent.
Cases of permanence of type and language and of change of culture are much more numerous. As a matter of fact, the whole historical development of Europe, from prehistoric times on, is one endless series of examples of this process, which seems to be much easier, since assimilation of cultures occurs everywhere without actual blood-mixture, as an effect of imitation. Proof of diffusion of cultural elements may be found in every single cultural area which covers a district in which many languages are spoken. In North America, California offers a good example of this kind; for here many languages are spoken, and there is a certain degree of differentiation of type, but at the same time a considerable uniformity of culture prevails (Kroeber). Another case in point is the coast of New Guinea, where, notwithstanding strong local differentiations, a certain fairly characteristic type of culture prevails, which goes hand in hand with a strong differentiation of languages. Among more highly civilized peoples, the whole area which is under the influence of Chinese culture might be given as an example.
These considerations make it fairly clear that, at least at the present time, anatomical type, language, and culture have not necessarily the same fates; that a people may remain constant in type and language, and change in culture; that it may remain constant in type, but change in language; or that it may remain constant in language, and change in type and culture. It is obvious, therefore, that attempts to classify mankind, based on the present distribution of type, language, and culture, must lead to different results, according to the point of view taken; that a classification based primarily on type alone will lead to a system which represents more or less accurately the blood-relationships of the people, which do not need to coincide with their cultural relationships; and that in the same way classifications based on language and culture do not need at all to coincide with a biological classification.
If this be true, then a problem like the Aryan problem, to which I referred before, really does not exist, because the problem is primarily a linguistic one, relating to the history of the Aryan languages; and the assumption that a certain definite people whose members have always been related by blood must have been the carriers of this language throughout history, and the other assumption, that a certain cultural type must have always belonged to this people,—are purely arbitrary ones, and not in accord with the observed facts.
Nevertheless it must be granted that in a theoretical consideration of the history of the types of mankind, of languages, and of cultures, we are led back to the assumption of early conditions, during which each type was much more isolated from the rest of mankind than it is at the present time. For this reason the culture and the language belonging to a single type must have been much more sharply separated from those of other types than we find them to be at the present period. It is true that such a condition has nowhere been observed; but the knowledge of historical developments almost compels us to assume its existence at a very early period in the development of mankind. If this is true, the question would arise, whether an isolated group at an early period was necessarily characterized by a single type, a single language, and a single culture, or whether in such a group different types, different languages, and different cultures may have been represented.
The historical development of mankind would afford a simpler and clearer picture if we were justified in assuming that in primitive communities the three phenomena had been intimately associated. No proof, however, of such an assumption, can be given. On the contrary, the present distribution of languages, as compared with the distribution of types, makes it plausible that even at the earliest times the biological units may have been wider than the linguistic units, and presumably also wider than the cultural units. I believe it may be safely said that all over the world the biological unit—disregarding minute local differences—is much larger than the linguistic unit; in other words, that groups of men who are so closely related in bodily appearance that we must consider them as representatives of the same variety of mankind, embrace a much larger number of individuals than the number of men speaking languages which we know to be genetically related. Examples of this kind may be given from many parts of the world. Thus, the European race—including under this term roughly all those individuals who are without hesitation classed by us as members of the white race—would include peoples speaking Indo-European, Basque, and Ural-Altaic languages. West African negroes would represent individuals of a certain negro type, but speaking the most diverse languages; and the same would be true, among Asiatic types, of Siberians; among American types, of part of the Californian Indians.
So far as our historical evidence goes, there is no reason to believe that the number of distinct languages has at any time been less than it is now. On the contrary, all our evidence goes to show that the number of apparently unrelated languages was much greater in earlier times than at present. On the other hand, the number of types that have presumably become extinct seems to be rather small, so that there is no reason to suppose that at an early period there should have been a nearer correspondence between the number of distinct linguistic and anatomical types; and we are thus led to the conclusion that presumably at an early time each human type may have existed in a number of small isolated groups, each of which may have possessed a language and culture of its own.
Incidentally we may remark here, that, from this point of view, the great diversity of languages found in many remote mountain areas should not be explained as the result of a gradual pressing-back of remnants of tribes into inaccessible districts, but appears rather as a survival of an older general condition of mankind, when every continent was inhabited by smaller groups of people speaking distinct languages. The present conditions would have developed through the gradual extinction of many of the old stocks and their absorption or extinction by others, which thus came to occupy a more extended territory.
However this may be, the probabilities are decidedly in favor of the assumption that there is no necessity to assume that originally each language and culture were confined to a single type, or that each type and culture were confined to one language; in short, that there has been at any time a close correlation between these three phenomena.
The assumption that type, language, and culture were originally closely correlated would entail the further assumption that these three traits developed approximately at the same period, and that they developed conjointly for a considerable length of time. This assumption does not seem by any means plausible. The fundamental types of man which are represented in the negroid race and in the mongoloid race must have been differentiated long before the formation of those forms of speech that are now recognized in the linguistic families of the world. I think that even the differentiation of the more important subdivisions of the great races antedates the formation of the existing linguistic families. At any rate, the biological differentiation and the formation of speech were, at this early period, subject to the same causes that are acting upon them now, and our whole experience shows that these causes may bring about great changes in language much more rapidly than in the human body. In this consideration lies the principal reason for the theory of lack of correlation of type and language, even during the period of formation of types and of linguistic families.[4]
What is true of language is obviously even more true of culture. In other words, if a certain type of man migrated over a considerable area before its language assumed the form which can now be traced in related linguistic groups, and before its culture assumed the definite type the further development of which can now be recognized, there would be no possibility of ever discovering a correlation of type, language, and culture, even if it had ever existed; but it is quite possible that such correlation has really never occurred.
It is quite conceivable that a certain racial type may have scattered over a considerable area during a formative period of speech, and that the languages which developed among the various groups of this racial type came to be so different that it is now impossible to prove them to be genetically related. In the same way, new developments of culture may have taken place which are so entirely disconnected with older types that the older genetic relationships, even if they existed, can no longer be discovered.
If we adopt this point of view, and thus eliminate the hypothetical assumption of correlation between primitive type, primitive language, and primitive culture, we recognize that any attempt at classification which includes more than one of these traits cannot be consistent.
It may be added that the general term “culture,” which has been used here, may be subdivided from a considerable number of points of view; and different results again might be expected when we consider the inventions, the types of social organization, or beliefs, as leading points of view in our classification.
After we have thus shown that language, culture, and type cannot be considered as constantly associated, and after we have recognized that the same type of man has developed distinct languages, the question still remains open, whether the languages developed by any one stock bear marks of superiority or inferiority. It has been claimed, for instance, that the highly developed inflected languages of Europe are much superior to the cumbersome agglutinative or polysynthetic languages of northern Asia and of America (Gabelentz). We have also been told that lack of phonetic discrimination, lack of power of abstraction, are characteristics of primitive languages. It is important to show whether these traits are really associated with any languages of primitive man. In a way this consideration leads us back to the study of alleged mental characteristics of distinct human types.