Anthropological Criteria for Race

After reading Londa Schiebinger's "Theories of Gender and Race," I was reminded of an article I read from my African Studies class a few weeks ago. While these classes tend to overlap quite often, I found a particular connection this week to Wyatt MacGaffey's "Who Owns Ancient Egypt?" I don't know if this link will work since it's on EReserve, but here it is: http://www.jstor.org/view/00218537/ap010111/01a00090/0. In the article, MacGaffey describes the work of Cheikh Anta Djop, a Senegalese professor who attempted to "prove" that the ancient Egyptians were more similar to sub-Saharan Africans than European or Middle Eastern peoples. MacGaffey criticizes Djop's work because he used the same racist methods outlined in Schiebinger's essay. Djop and his colleagues "fully recogniz[ed] the worthlessness of racial classifications based on such criteria as skull measurements...hair form, presence or absence of cattle-keeping...[but] they nevertheless quote conclusions based on such criteria when they can draw support from them..."

I found it interesting and rather relieving that MacGuffey dismisses the techniques fully described by Schiebinger as antiquated and racist. However, Djop's paper occurred in the 1970s, and it is startling that he used such methods to try and prove the race of a people, even if his thesis was reversed from the norm. I believe that such racial classifications should never be used, not even if they attempt to side with the traditionally oppressed minority. MacGuffey does not say that the ancient Egyptians were not African; the simple fact that they lived on the African continent leads me to believe that they were African. Rather, he criticizes bad science, no matter what the result. As someone interested in science and striving towards its objectivity, I would have to agree.