people of color & Chicano

[ANNE V. GILBERT]

Tony and all:

> And Caucasian is the worst of all. How many white people have a clue
> where the Caucasus is (are? I don't even know if that's a plural or
> singular), let alone whether that is where their ancestors originate!

Since few people have any idea where the Caucasus Mountains are, a lot of
these folks use "Caucasian"  to mean "whites" generally.  They have no idea
that one Johann Friedrich Blumenbach coined the term in the 18th century to
describe what he thought was a perfect specimen of a "white" person, namely,
the skull of somebody who had lived in the Caucasus region.  And
"Caucasian", in Russian, anyway, actually still does refer *only* to people
from the Caucasus, not to "whites" generally.  Are we sure we want to follow
Johann Friedrich Blumenbach, who thought "blacks" were "less developed" than
"whites"?  Although, to his credit, Blumenbach thought "blacks" and people
from Africa were perfectly capable of becoming "developed" though education.
Anne Gilbert