Expert: John Shea - 11/5/2005

Question
what is race, how do anthropologists define it. how did the different races arose  

Answer
Dear Algazali
Race is a way of classifying people, usually in terms of superficial physical characterstics, skin color, hair texture, cranial features, etc.
Anthropologists don't really use race as a way of classifying people anymore for a couple of reasons:  first, genetic studies show that there is more variation within most "racial" groups than between them.  Second, most racial groupings are at least partly social/cultural, rather than strictly biological.  Thirdly, racial classifications oversimplify a complex, multivariate, pattern of human biological variability.  Lastly, racial classifications provide no predictive basis for inferring human behavior.
The concept of "race" probably arose as a function of naval technology.  When people had to travel overland, or anchor their ships after short journeys, differences between the people one encountered were predictably relatively minor.  Once ships could stay out longer (weeks, months) then each landfall resulted in encounters with people who looked and acted remarkably different from the last people encountered.  The first mentions one finds of "race" as a way of classifying people coincide fairly closely with improvements in naval technology after 1400-1600 AD.
The actual physical features used to classify people into "races" are a mix of things.  Some (skin color) probably have adaptive value under different geographic circumstances.  Others probably just reflect genetic drift among small human populations around the end of the last Ice Age.
I hope this helps you.
Sincerely
John Shea