Michael:
>Why do some still think Indo-European Speakers="Caucasians". I still
>come across this way of thinking in books, and it seems many still make
>this connection.
This is somewhat of a moot point. The use of the term "Caucasian" as
a racial designation is completely meaningless and unscientific (despite
its incessant use on American news, to my chagrin). In order to use it
in an educated way, we must define accurately what "Caucasian" means.
Well, if you've ever tried to narrow down what it means, you finally have
to give up.
All of us come from such diverse backgrounds that any racial term is
evidently without logic. These terms are as subjective as colour terms.
If you ask ten people what "indigo" looks like, you'll get ten different
answers.
If we want to know what the IEs might have looked like on a whole,
again, we can't expect a singular group of people. Archaeology
shows that the suspected area and timeframe of the Indo-European
speaking population contained a fairly diverse group of people. Some
of a Mediterranean type, others more related to Northern Europe.
And, of course, don't forget the "Middle-Eastern" genes that entered
Europe during the Neolithic (cf. Cavalli-Sforza). The XinJiang mummies
whose ancestry has been traced back to the Black Sea would suggest
that there were probably some IE speakers that were fair. But doubtful
that they all were. The Eastern Mediterranean was highly cosmopolitan
since the neolithic.
- gLeN
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