Mixed Race Studies

The Physical Anthropology and Genetics of Marginal People of the Southeastern United States

American Anthropologist
Volume 74, Issue 3 (June 1972)
pages 719–734
DOI: 10.1525/aa.1972.74.3.02a00360

William S. Pollitzer
University of North Carolina

Admixture of White, Negro, and Indian peoples of the Southeastern United States from colonial days on has led to some unique populations isolated by social status. In time they formed distinctive gene pools. On the basis of physical traits and serological factors, it has been possible to reconstruct the approximate genetic contribution of parental populations to the hybrid ones. Some inherited diseases have also been concentrated in these isolates. Both differential fertility and changing social factors may affect the future of these populations.

Over vast spans of time populations of mankind have evolved many physical differences. In accordance with well established genetic principles, they arose because mutations in the genes controlling such traits occurred at random but conferred upon the individuals selective advantages. Thus, heavy pigmentation of the skin may have been an advantage to those living in the extreme sunlight of the tropics. Some anthropologists believe that body form and facial features may similarly represent adaptations to extremes of temperature and humidity. Geographical barriers such as oceans and deserts serve to isolate populations and emphasize their distinctive characteristics, although gradients exist between the physical traits of related people. Man’s increasing capacity for food production, most notably in the neolithic era when the cultivation of crops and domestication of animals greatly increased his food resources, contributed to the growth of populations. Particular groups of people of similar appearance expanded in numbers and later in territory, giving the impression that the earth was populated with a few “races.” An earlier generation of anthropologists, searching for distinct types, classified all people on the basis of a few physical traits such as skin color, hair form, head shape or nose width. More modern students of mankind have recognized that there are indeed only clines or gradients in all of these traits and that mixture is a universal phenomenon.

Can we then speak of “races” of man at all? While the concept of fixed types remains in the popular thinking, many scientists have gone to the opposite extreme and denied the reality of race at all. My own position is an intermediate one in which I liken human populations to the surface of the earth. Here is a small elevation and, there, a larger one; here is a single contour and, there, a doubled one. Shallow valleys separate some high ground; deep valleys separate others. Who can say, then, what is to be labeled a hill and what is to be called a mountain? Shall we use one name or two names for closely related projections? Where we draw the line-what labels we attach-these are arbitrary decisions; but the rises and the falls in the earth’s surface are facts of nature. So it is with human populations. How finely we wish to divide them, how broadly we lump them or the designations we give to them will inevitably vary; but large populations with distinctive features are still recognizable. It is, of course, mating preferences for physical characteristics which govern the collection of genes in so-called gene pools; and it is our culture which determines these choices. In that sense, those physically recognized groupings which we may popularly refer to as “races” are dependent upon our culture both for their formation and for their definition…

Read the entire article here.

The American Isolates

American Anthropologist
Volume 74, Issue 3 (June 1972)
pages 693–694
DOI: 10.1525/aa.1972.74.3.02a00320

B. Eugene Griessman
Auburn University

More than 200 American isolates have been identified historically in at least eighteen of the eastern states of the United States. Their total population has been estimated at 75,000. Those who populate these communities commonly bear unflattering local names-Red Bones, Brass Ankles, Issues-although they themselves usually want to be known as Indians or as Whites.

They are an obscure people in American life and many of them would prefer to remain unnoticed because they are keepers of secrets. Some of them, or their children, or distant relatives, have crossed racial boundaries so that it would not do for them to receive much attention. Scholars for the most part have granted them their wish. “As a sizeable native minority,” William Harlan Gilbert, Jr., wrote twenty-six years ago, “they deserve more attention than the meager investigations which sociologists and anthropologists have hitherto made of their problems” (1946:438-447).

This state of affairs has been remedied partially by a few scholars who have studied these populations over a period of years. Some of their findings were presented for the first time at the Annual Meeting of the Southern Anthropological Society in 1970. And now with this issue of the American Anthropologist several articles will provide the basis for a wider knowledge of the enclaves…

Read the entire article here.

On Mixed-Racial Isolates

American Anthropologist
Volume 76, Issue 2 (June 1974)
pages 343–344
DOI: 10.1525/aa.1974.76.2.02a00190

G. Harry Stopp, Jr.
Louisiana State University

In recent articles on American isolates (American Anthropologist 74: 693-7 34) Beale, and Dane and Griessman predicted change for “mixed-racial” communities in the United States stemming from the recent civil rights legislation. They alluded to “Red Power” movements or associations and coalitions of some kind as mechanisms for such possible divergence from past models of behavior.

These gentlemen have presented an excellent outline of the problems many “mixed-racial” isolates have had to face. Dane and Griessman’s North Carolina example could serve as a model of almost every isolate group in the United States. Beale’s chronology of group identity assumption gives us insight into the time-depth most isolate groups will exhibit. Both articles, however, lean too heavily on the “Indian” identity as both the isolate groups’ own solution to its controversial background and as the ultimate role of all isolates.

If we assume American isolates to be “tri-racial,” I believe we will see that their reactions to racial problems have been, and continue to be, three-fold. The Lumbee have chosen to be Red; the community around them has accepted this; so, we could consider the Lumbee as Indians. With the advent of recent civil rights legislation, I expect that the Lumbee, and any other isolate group that has assumed a Red identity, will remain a cohesive group, possibly under a banner of Red Power. The Creoles of Mobile have, on the other hand, often accepted the mantle of the Black man. Bond (1931:556) reported this, and I have seen evidence of this also in my brief acquaintance with the Mobile Creoles. I can only assume that, with the advent of civil rights legislation, this group will begin to identify with the Black Power movement (though not necessarily on a radical basis). I would expect any isolate group that has accepted a Black identity to maintain cohesiveness as a Black group…

Read the entire article here.

An Overview of the Phenomenon of Mixed Racial Isolates in the United States

American Anthropologist
Volume 74, Issue 3 (June 1972)
pages 704–710
DOI: 10.1525/aa.1972.74.3.02a00340

Calvin L. Beale
Economic Research Service
U.S. Department of Agriculture

The subject of the paper is population groups of real or alleged tri-racial origin—Indian, White, and Negro. There is a review of the emergence of such groups in American history, their conflicts with public authorities, and their recognition by researchers. The past importance of separate schools as a boundary maintenance mechanism is discussed, with emphasis on the declining persistence of such schools today. The role of the church as the typical remaining group institution is noted. Mention is made of the decreasing proportion of endogamous marriages in recent times. The essentially rural nature of these racial isolates is pointed out, and the general societal trend of rural depopulation is stated to be affecting their size and continued existence. A suggested list of research needs is offered.

In About 1890, a young Tennessee woman asked a state legislator, “Please tell me what is a Malungeon?” “A Malungeon” said he, “isn’t a nigger, and he isn’t an Indian, and he isn’t a White man. God only knows what he is. I should call him a Democrat, only he always votes the Republican ticket” (Drumgoole 1891:473).

The young woman, Will Allen Drumgoole, soon sought out the Melungeons in remote Hancock County and lived with them for awhile to determine for herself what they were. Afterward, in the space of a ten page article, she described them as “shiftless,” “idle,” “illiterate,” “thieving,” “defiant,” “distillers of brandy,” “lawless,” “close,” “rogues,” “suspicious,” “inhospitable,” “untruthful,” “cowardly,” “sneaky,” “exceedingly immoral,” and “unforgiving.” She also spoke of their “cupidity and cruelty,” and ended her work by concluding, “The most than can be said of one of them is, ‘He is a Malungeon,’ a synonym for all that is doubtful and mysterious-and unclean” (Drumgoole 1891:479). Miss Drumgoole was essentially a sympathetic observer.

The existence of mixed racial populations that constitute a distinctive segment of society is not unique to the United States needless to say. But this nation must rank near the top in the number of such communities and in their general public obscurity. I refer in particular to groups of real or alleged White-Indian-Negro mixtures (such as the Melungeons) who are not tribally affiliated or traceable with historical continuity to a particular tribe. It is also logical to include a few groups of White-Negro origin that lack the Indian component. The South in particular is rich in such population strains, with all states except Arkansas and Oklahoma having such groups at present or within the twentieth century. (And I would not be surprised to be contradicted on my exception of those two states.)…

Read the entire article here.

The “Sabines”: A Study of Racial Hybrids in a Louisiana Coastal Parish

Social Forces
Volume 29, Number 2 (December, 1950)
pages 148-154

Vernon J. Parenton

Roland J. Pellegrin

Read before the thirteenth annual meeting of the Southern Sociological Society, Biloxi, Mississippi, April 15, 1950.

Historically, the position of the racial and  cultural  hybrid in rural American society has received but little attention from sociologists. Beginning with the twentieth century, however, and especially since 1930, a number of social scientists have centered their investigations on such marginal groups. The acculturative processes associated with the formation of hybrid groups are as difficult to analyze as they are sociologically interesting. Nevertheless the complexity of these processes may be viewed as a challenge rather than as a barrier to social investigations.

Among those areas of the United States where hybrid groups arc found, Louisiana constitutes an interesting socio-cultural laboratory for such research. Partly because of the heterogeneous racial and ethnic character of the state’s population, with its concomitant diversity of cultures, and partly because of its geographical position, Louisiana contains a number of racial and cultural “islands,” the inhabitants oi which range in color from brown to near white. This paper is a preliminary report on a tri-racial group, derisively called the “Sabines,” who inhabit the marshy fringe of a Louisiana parish bordering the Gulf of Mexico. These persons, of mixed white, Indian, and Negro ancestry, have a unique history.

Historical Background

The first white men to explore the Gulf Coast found several Indian tribes inhabiting the area. These tribes may be classified into five linguistic groups: the Muskhogean, Natchez, Tunican, Chitimachan, and Atakapan. In Louisiana the most important group was the Muskhogean, which was, composed of a variety of tribes, including the Houma, Washa, Chawasha, Bayogoula, Chakchiuma, and several others.  The Indian element present in the Sabines of today is derived from a variety of these Muskhogean tribes, but principally from the Houmas…

Read or purchase the article here.

The People of Frilot Cove: A Study of Racial Hybrids

The American Journal of Sociology
Volume 57, Number 2 (September 1951)
pages 145-149

J. Hardy Jones, Jr.

Vernon J. Parenton

Frilot Cove is a color-conscious, semi-isolated rural community of 302 persons with an ante bellum cultural background, who, though they approximate Nordic and Mediterranean types, are classified as Negroes. Criteria of upper-class status are light skin, income, and family background. Discrimination by whites draws them to the Negro, but their concern is not with their personal, but with their group, situation.

This paper summarizes certain findings of a more comprehensive studyI which analyzed some sociologically important elements of a hybrid racial community of St. Landry Parish, Louisiana. The purpose of that study was to analyze social organization and social change in a semi-isolated hybrid rural community: Its historical origin; its population characteristics; its social, cultural, and economic characteristics; and the attitudes of its inhabitants to race. The principal sources of data were schedules, interviews, informal conversation, personal observations, attitude inventories, written materials obtained directly from community members, microfilm copies of old United States census records, and pertinent published materials.

The history of this community, Frilot Cove, is part of the long and interesting history of the state of Louisiana. The first explorers in Louisiana were the Spaniards, who were seeking riches; but they failed to establish themselves permanently in the country of the great Mississippi. Francewas the first to succeed in establishing colonies. Through the efforts of such men as De la Salle, D’Iberville, and De Bienville, Louisiana became an important part of the New World, Although Louisiana was returned to Spain for about forty years (prior to 1803, when the territory became a part of the United States), the French culture was predominant and is still much in evidence in the southern parts of the state.

In 1765 a military and trading post was established at Opelousas. The fertile prairie land surrounding the post soon attracted many settlers. In 1807, St, Landry Parish was formed and Opelousas became the seat of parish government. According to the United States marshal of the Western District, which included St. Landry Parish, there were 532 free colored persons and 4,680 white persons in this area in 1840. The census shows that there were among the free colored only thirty-three males to fifty-nine females in the twenty-four- to thirty-six-year age group. On the other hand, in the white group from twenty to forty years of age there were 835 males to 295 females—an extreme shortage of females. Under these circumstances it is not surprising that some of the white men took their wives from the free colored class.

By the end of the nineteenth century the parish had a population of 52,170 inhabitants, slightly over half of whom were counted as Negroes. This increase of the Negro population came about largely as a result of the many cotton plantations throughout the area.

Among these Negroes were many mulattoes, primarily the descendants of white men and colored women. Of the parents of these people, many were “free men of color” during ante bellum days and owned plantation…

Read or purchase the article here.

Trends in the Naming of Tri-Racial Mixed-Blood Groups in the Eastern United States

American Speech
Volume 22, Number 2 (April, 1947)
pages 81-87

A. R. Dunlap
University of Delaware

C. A. Weslager
University of Delaware

In the eastern part of the United States, particularly in the southern and middle-Atlantic portions, are a number of populations groups, so-called ‘ethnic-island,’ whose members combine, in varying degrees, the characteristics of Caucasoid, Negroid, and Indian racial stocks. To quote W. H. Gilbert, Jr., who has written extensively of mixed-blood groups, these racial islands

seem to develop especially where environmental circumstances such as forbidding swamps and inaccessible and barren mountain country favor their growth.  Many are located along the tidewater of the Atlantic coast where swamps or island and peninsulas have protected them… Others are farther inland in the Piedmont area and are found with their backs up against the wall of the Blue Ridge or Alleghenies.  A few… are to be found on the very top of the Blue Ridge and on the several ridges of the Appalachian Great Valley just beyond.

A sufficient number of these tri-racial groups has now been reported in various sociological and ethnological journals to make possible a study of the names employed to distinguish this type of mixed-bloods from mixed-bloods of bi-racial origin, such as mulattoes, quadroons, octoroons, etc., or from ‘pure’ bloods of one of the three principal racial stocks, i.e., whites, Indians, and Negroes. From the alphabetical list which follows have been excluded names of ethnic groups which perpetuate Indian tribal names for example, the Nanticokes and Houmas mentioned in Gilbert’s ‘Memorandum’; or the surviving Powhatan tribes of Virginia, the Cherokee, and other Algonkian and Iroquoian descendants in the Eastern Woodlands area with tribal organizations.

Read the entire article here.

Trends in Mate Selection in a Tri-Racial Isolate

Social Forces
Volume 37, Number 3 (March 1959)
pages 215-221

Thomas J. Harte
Catholic University of America

Read before the twenty-first annual meeting of the Southern Sociological Society in Asheville, North Carolina, April 11, 1958.

The “Brandywine” population of Southern Maryland is a tri-racial hybrid group which manifests many of the physical and social characteristics common to other known isolates located through the eastern part of the United States.  It is reputedly descended from mixed white, Indian, and Negro stock, although its most group-conscious members tend to reject the theory of Negro intermixture in their family background.  The skin color and hair texture of members seem to substantiate the theory of some white ancestry, and although a relatively high proportion possess some physical characteristics usually associated with Negro types, in general this population is marked by a high degree of “visibility.”  The Brandywine group is predominately rural. It has a total population of approximately 5,000.  Roman Catholicism is today, and has been traditionally, the religion of almost all of its members. Sixteen surnames are common in the population; four of these are unique to the group, the remaining twelve being more or less common among Negro and/or white families in the area.

The group has succeeeded in maintaining a considerable measure of isolation from the larger Negro and white populations through endogamous marriages as well as by residential and, to some extent, occupational segregation…

Read or purchase the article here.

Factors in the Microevolution of a Triracial Isolate

American Journal of Human Genetics
Volume 18, Number 1 (January 1966)
pages 26-38

W. S. Pollitzer
Department of Anatomy
University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill

R. M. Menegaz-Bock
Genetics Training Committe
University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill

J. C. Herion
Department of Medicine
University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill

Triracial Isolates today attract the attention of the anthropologist, the geneticist, and the medical scientist as questions arise concerning the origin of such isolates, their history, social status, breeding structure, and inherited pathological conditions. This paper describes the physical, serological, and clinical characteristics of a hybrid population in northeastern North Carolina (Witkop et al., 1960; Menegaz-Bock, 1962), its racial composition, and the cultural and biological factors in its evolution.

History

The population can be traced at least as far back as the American Revolution. The most common surname in this region today is the same as that of two brothers, said to be descended from Cherokee Indians and whites, who fought in that war. The census of 1790 for the county in which the majority of this population now live lists this name only under the designation “all other free persons;” four of seven other surnames frequent in this population are listed as “free white,” while three are listed under both of these headings. Many of these names, well-known in the isolate today, can be traced through the census reports of the nineteenth century. In 1800, ten are listed, mostly under “free persons of color,” and the census of 1810 lists six of these as “other free persons except Indians not taxed.” By 1820, most of these names appear in the column “free Negro.” Eleven surnames common in the current population are listed in the census of 1830 as “free colored persons,” and most of these are listed under the same heading again in 1840. The census of 1850, designating free inhabitants as “white,” “black,” and “mulatto,” registers a dozen of these family names as “mulattoes” and half of these also as “white.” In 1860, the census for the western district of the county listed 13 of the common names as free inhabitants, either white, black, or mulatto. In the 1870 census for the township where most of the population now lives, five of seven last names common in the group include mulattoes. The census of 1880 contains ten names common in the township now, and all but two of these are to be found under “mulatto.” The census of 1890 was destroyed, and names are not released for the censuses from 1900 on…

Read the entire article here.

The Melungeon Identity Movement and the Construction of Appalachian Whiteness

Journal of Linguistic Anthropology
Volume 11, Issue 1 (June 2001)
pages 131-146
DOI: 10.1525/jlin.2001.11.1.131

Anita Puckett, Associate Professor of Appalachian Studies
Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University

How this binary system is discursively constituted depends upon the ways in which elements of a repertoire interconnect to distribute or consolidate power and privilege across discursive contexts. Circulation of the revitalized lexeme Melungeon as a valued “object” within Appalachian discourse reveals linguistic processes by which white racial privilege is constructed and expanded, mixed-race classification excluded, and nonwhite disenfranchisement reproduced.

Read the entire article here.