Mixed Blood

“Mixed Blood”, written by Jeffrey Fish, is a great article that seeks to tackle the persistent myth that there is such a thing as “race” among the human species.  This was a fascinating article to read because it is a very methodical and logical look at what we as humans incorrectly think race is.  Race is nothing more than the average persons’ way of making sense of all the biological differences between different groups of people, whether that pertains to skin color or eyelid form, for example.  Fish makes a point of noting that we (mostly referring to Americans in this article) overlook other obvious giveaways that race is nothing but a misconception like the fact that different people have different body shapes, whether they are round in cold climates to allow for less surface area for heat to radiate off of, or long bodies in the much hotter climates.  The best substitute that Fish presented, in my mind, to replace “race” would by the Portuguese word tipo, meaning “type” in Englsih.  After reading what Fish had to say on the matter, I feel that although we as humans are without a doubt the same species, and that race is nonexistent, there are different “types” of humans due to inevitable factors such as natural selection, mutation, and genetic drift, as cited by Fish early on in the article.  This use of tipo should not be taken negatively or as a derogatory word at all, but rather as a description of the small differences between humans.