The rise of the mongrels

[jimmy olsen]

A very American style of multiculturalism.

Stuff in bold is emphasized by author, stuff in italics was added by me.
http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/gnxp/2013/06/mackinders-revenge-and-the-rise-of-the-mongrels/#more-21676

...In earlier ages the narrative of the rise of civilizations tended toward an explicit or implicit racial diffusionism. By this, I mean that in antiquity and the early medieval period potentates asserted lineages which went back to the ancient Greeks, Trojans or Hebrews. This established their legitimacy because the high civilization which Northern Europeans inherited had Mediterranean antecedents. In our more recent era more explicitly racialist narratives of Nordic hordes spilling out of the north have been bandied about. A working assumption in both these models is that the purity of the vigorous herrenvolk of yore degrades over time. Asabiyyah unwinds via natural processes.

Moderns have turned their back on these narratives because they are legendary and unpalatable. Even believing Christians are unlikely to accept that the British royal family is of the lineage of king David. The heroes of Homer are simply not relevant to us due to the decline of the classical education. As far as the theories of Nordic superman, that sort of racial triumphalism went out of favor with the Nazis. In their place is an inchoate set of impulses, perhaps best articulated by the pots not people framework in archaeology. Rather than a broad framework there is a vague sentiment of cultural egalitarianism which fits uncomfortably with the rapid and explosive spread of "pots" periodically.

But I am here to present a new model. One of mongrelization, hybridization, and synthetic vigor. The cultural elements of this model have been long present. The Ottoman Turks assimilated Armenian, Kurd, and Greek notables, so that the Sultans of the later years had little "Turkic" blood in them. But their language remained Turkic, and some aspects of their cultural mythology was grounded in their Central Asian origins. Today multiculturalism is often perceived to be an egalitarian ideology, but the Ottomans represent a more accurate historical instance. Though synthetic in origin they had a core self-identity which was domineering, expansive, and acquisitive. Those who did not assimilate to that self-identity were made to be subjects, with second class status.

Today genetics is telling us that these long term connections and diffusions across Eurasia are very old. Modern Europeans seem to have a non-trivial quantum of East Eurasian ancestry. Many East Eurasian groups also exhibit the same pattern. Modern Indians are clearly a hybrid between a West Eurasian and South Eurasian set of populations. And these are simply the more distant genetic affinities which have been scrambled. Today Dienekes posted a translation of a German research project which documents the ethnic complexity of the Eurasian heartland thousands of years ago. Multi-layered complexity in the heartland has very antique roots. In Empires of the Silk Road Christopher Beckwith emphasizes that the free men of the steppe formed bonds of brotherhood which cross-linked them across ethnicity and family (e.g. Jamukha and Temujin). Perhaps these ideological paradigms predicated upon fictive kinship are a natural response of peoples whose origins are synthetic, and who can not fall back on implicit and traditional myths of identity.

The massive polities of the Eurasian littoral had enough surplus worthy of stealing on the part of its rulers. In ancient Egypt pharaoh even had the whole land stolen for his own private property. This is what the brotherhood of the steppe craved, and this is what the often captured. How did they do this? As peoples with diverse origins from brought together from the antipodes of Eurasia perhaps their primary currency was in ideological toolkits which might allow for greater coordination and organization. While the rulers of the littoral societies viewed their peasant masses like an extractive resource, men such as Temujin and Atilla had be entrepreneurial, and always maximize the productivity of their human capital and operate as a lean organizational machine. They were the investment bankers of their age, plundering the human capital of distant lands, and binding them together toward one selfish purpose.

[Siege]

bottom line?

[Valmy]

bottom line?

A new paradigm shift in the ideology predicated on fictive kinships for those of synthetic origins.

[The Minsky Moment]

"Pots not people" is not, as Khan seems to think, some kind of naive concession to political correctness.  Rather it is a basic principle of interpretive parisomy based on the fact that one cannot safely draw conclusions about general cultural affinities from the mere fact of similarities in certain kinds of material culture or even burial practices.  The danger of ignoring such principles is the assumption of attitudes that prompt one to make sweeping generalizations ("the rulers of the littoral societies viewed their peasant masses like an extractive resource"), set up impressive sounding but dubious distinctions (synthetic origins vs. origins based on "implicit and traditional myths of identity"), and fall back on bizarrely anachronistic analogies (" Temujin and Atilla. . .  were the investment bankers of their age ...")

[Siege]

1- All cultures are synthethic to some degrees.

2- No culture sees itself as synthetic. With the exception, perhaps, of the USA.

3- People belong to a culture regardless of ethnicity.

[jimmy olsen]

"Pots not people" is not, as Khan seems to think, some kind of naive concession to political correctness.

Well, genetic sequencing proved that theory wrong though. The pots spread because the people who made them did.

[mongers]

I didn't know they'd started 'MBA's in history and archaeology too.   

[The Minsky Moment]

Well, genetic sequencing proved that theory wrong though.

First, "pots not people" is not a "theory" but an interpretive principle that states that evidence of similarities in a dimension of material culture are insufficient in themsleves to establish broader cultural similarities.  Pointing to genetic evidence -- as an appeal to *another* kind of evidence -- does not disprove the utility of a principle that demands other kinds of evidence.  It confirms it.

Second, it is impossible to respond to such a grostesque generalization.  What genetic evidence?  Where and when?  And what "pots" are you connecting this to?  Are you claiming that every overlap in any aspect of material culture involves genetic overlap as well?  Because that is very obviously false. 

Third, even in particular instances where the spread of a genetic marker seems to coincide with the spread of a particular kind of artifact, one cannot draw firm conclusions that a broader cultural movement or transformation is occurring. 

[PDH]

Tim read a blog that said so.

[Razgovory]

Rather it is a basic principle of interpretive parisomy based on the fact that one cannot safely draw conclusions about general cultural affinities from the mere fact of similarities in certain kinds of material culture or even burial practices. 

Are you in academia or something?

[mongers]

Well, genetic sequencing proved that theory wrong though.

First, "pots not people" is not a "theory" but an interpretive principle that states that evidence of similarities in a dimension of material culture are insufficient in themsleves to establish broader cultural similarities.  Pointing to genetic evidence -- as an appeal to *another* kind of evidence -- does not disprove the utility of a principle that demands other kinds of evidence.  It confirms it.

Second, it is impossible to respond to such a grostesque generalization.  What genetic evidence?  Where and when?  And what "pots" are you connecting this to?  Are you claiming that every overlap in any aspect of material culture involves genetic overlap as well?  Because that is very obviously false. 

Third, even in particular instances where the spread of a genetic marker seems to coincide with the spread of a particular kind of artifact, one cannot draw firm conclusions that a broader cultural movement or transformation is occurring.

See the sales figures histories for mac book pros and iphones and the tendency of said owners to breed amongst themselves.   

[jimmy olsen]

Tim read a blog that said so.

When blogs say such things I actually follow the links and read the articles they are referring to.

[The Minsky Moment]

Silk garments appear in significant quantities in Rome during the early Empire.
Do we have evidence here of a sudden incursion or migration of Chinese raiders?  No - indeed the Romans didn't even know China existed.
However, there was probably significant migration of various peoples into Rome during the very same period, although with no linkage to silk.
We are lucky that with ancient Rome of this era our source material and evidence is so rich that we can avoid some basic interpretive errors.
But that is by no means the norm in the ancient world.

[mongers]

Silk garments appear in significant quantities in Rome during the early Empire.
Do we have evidence here of a sudden incursion or migration of Chinese raiders? No - indeed the Romans didn't even know China existed.
However, there was probably significant migration of various peoples into Rome during the very same period, although with no linkage to silk.
We are lucky that with ancient Rome of this era our source material and evidence is so rich that we can avoid some basic interpretive errors.
But that is by no means the norm in the ancient world.

Interesting in a way that 'Chinese whispers' failed to work, or perhaps they did in that they conveyed no accurate information? 

Were intermediaries passing of the wares to each other as their own or a closely related culture/manufacturer's produce?

[The Minsky Moment]

Romans got silk from Parthia and their goods were exchanged on as well.
Both empires "knew" about each other primarily from legends and travellers tales heard third or fourth hand.