Talk:Pamirid race

This article needs improving

While this article could potentially be of interest, I think it has a lot of problems. First, there are zero sources and I added a slew of fact tags only to have the creator of the article, Math920, revert all of them. This is unfortunate since that user actually names the authors of the sources, but does not name the sources, which should be easy enough to include. Second, while I'm familiar with the Pamirs, Fergana and Central Asia in general, I've never heard of a "Pamir-Fergana race" and I think this page would be better named "Pamir-Fergana racial theory." A simple google search of "Pamir-Fergana race" does turn up 5,000 hits from sources based on Russian, but this is not a widely recognized group and it's in reality a theoretical construct, and not a scientific fact. Thirdly, Math920 is lacking in some basic knowledge of proper wikipedia editing protocol, such as not creating a link for every instance of a term. For example, "Tajiks", "Uzbeks", and "Central Asia" each appear a number of times in the article and Math920 linked every instance of them. This is causing a major editing headache for the rest of us. Finally, I don't think including a list of "notable" members of Pamir-Fergana race has any use other than expressing fantastic nationalist claims. A list of such people that was composed of mostly figures that the government in Tajikistan and Tajik nationalist historians claim as "Tajik." I deleted that list.

I've tried cleaning up the article and even left a message at Math920's talk page, but that user promptly reverted all of fixes I made. David Straub (talk) 21:37, 10 April 2010 (UTC)

Response

1)I will add all the sources. This article is a translation from Russian into English of materials from highly reliable sources. 2)In Tajikistan and Uzbekistan, even children at schools know about Pamir-Fergana race, they get information about it, when they study history of formation of their peoples on the history lessons. In the West, Carlton Coon can class Tajiks as Alpines (you can search on google: "Turkestan and the Tajiks" or "Asiatic Alpines")in Soviet Union Tajiks and Uzbeks were classed in Pamir-Fergana race.The term "Pamir-Fergana race"(памиро-ферганская раса) or "Race of Central Asian interfluvial"(раса среднеазиатского междуречья) is used in all Soviet and Russian books on physical anthropology,history etc., beginning from 1930s and up until today. This race was and is a scientific fact in the post USSR the same way as races with names: "Nordic" or "Borreby" are a reality in the West. References to Oshanin, Yarkho and Ginzburg as well as use of Russian term "Pamir-Fergana race" can be found in many western and eastern written books on anthropology( For example in the book by Ilse Schwidetzky Grundlagen der Rassensystematik (Fundamentals of racial classification)-the book which was written in 1974). And if someone from the West don't know about term "Pamir-Fergana race" and can't find information about it on English internet, it doesn't mean that scientists of the West, who read international scientific literature, are not aware about the research of their Russian colleagues. It is very informative to inform English speaking peoples about research made by the Soviet/Russian scientists. And of course there is no "Pamir-Fergana racial theory", there were debates and several theories about its origin, the same way as there were debates about origin of Nordics or Mediterraneans in the West. What is important to know is that methods and terminology used in the Russian anthropology school is very different from terminology used by the Western anthropologists. Analog of Soviet "Pamir-Fergana race" in the West is von Eikshdet's "Turanid/Pamirid". 3) In case of editing wikipedia- Yes, this is my first article and I will be happy if someone helps me to improve this article, making it more accessible and informative,BUT NOT DELETING RELIABLE INFORMATION.4)In case of "list of notable members which express fantastic nationalist claims"...Tajik government or historians never claimed that Ulugbeg or Shah Rukh were Tajiks. People can belong to different races but be part of one nation (for example north French are Nordics, central-Alpines,southern-Mediterraneans) or they can be of one race but belong to different nations (Nordics can be found in Germany,France,Norway, Russia etc.)That list didn't contain even a single "fantastic nationalistic" idea, instead information of that article is nothing but a word-to-word translation from Russian into English of materials which were written by such famous academicians like Mikhail Gerasimov- historical figure who himself had exhumed the bodies of such historical figures like Tamerlane,Ivan the Terrible, Rudaki, Ulugbek etc. and reconstructed their appearance, so the world could see them. And of course being an anthropologist, Gerasimov used scientific methods to analyze the skulls and classify them...There is nothing good in deleting the article and preventing English speaking peoples be aware of very interesting materials about historical figure's appearance reconstruction. Especially when all this materials are available to the Russian speakers. (Math920 (talk) 03:42, 11 April 2010 (UTC))

I applaud Math920's efforts in writing this article, but Math920 has to understand that wikipedia is not a forum to publish works without any sort of critical editorial review. If you post something on wikipedia, it will be edited by other users. If you don't want someone to edit it, then please don't post it on this website. And here's my response to the above comments.

1. I would still support changing the named to "Pamir-Fergana racial theory." There is a not a scientific consensus on this issue, regardless of the decades of work Soviet/Russian scholars have done. This article is similar to the "Ural-Altaic languages" article, which was once a theory some in the West and Russian supported, but is now considered out of date. If the article isn't moved, at least insert some language that lets the readers know this is a theoretical concept or hypothesis.

2. Math920, you have to stop inserting a link for each instance of a word. If you need help with this, please see: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikilink#Wikilinks

3. The section on notable individuals with Pamir-Fergana racial characteristics would be best kept if it was condensed into a paragraph into a few sentences. The way it has been written twice by Math920 is not supported by any sort of scientific literature.

4. It is good that the sources were added, but you need to add inline citations. See the following page for instructions.

David Straub (talk) 23:58, 11 April 2010 (UTC)

this is a valid topic, within our coverage of scientific racism. Math920 keeps writing "in-universe" as it were, taking the concepts of 1930s racialist physical anthropology at face value. This is of course not arguable. --dab (𒁳) 13:25, 12 April 2010 (UTC)

R

I tried to insert citations to improve this young article, but instead Dbachmann removed all the information and added false data, claiming it is "not arguable"---He wrote: "Pamirid race is a category in scientific racism, introduced by Yarkho (1933)"----Never Yarkho did introduce the term "Pamirid race" he introduced "Pamir-Fergana race", Moreover, Dbachmann don't know the differences between physical anthropology (which class humanity into races) and Scientific Racism( which tries to proof, that there are "Superior" and "Inferior" races). Ideas of "Scientific racism" are obsolete, biased, unproven conceptions of 19th century, which are considered today as NOT SCIENTIFIC. Pamir-Fergana race and Soviet anthropologist Yarkho has NOTHING to do with scientific racism and racists of 19th century!! Moreover Dbachmann says that "Math920 is taking concepts of 1930s racialist physical anthropology”---- Instead, Pamir-fergana race is a name of a race which is used from 1930s until right now! In 2010, this term is used in all published books on anthropology and ethnography in Russia and post USSR as well as in the West and East! As an evidence that this is not 1930s concept, here is an article from November 1994 by the Chinese anthropologists who use the same "1930s concept" or "Pamir-Fergana racial theory" or "hypothesis"

http://www.sino-platonic.org/complete/spp051_xinjiang_skeletons.pdf  (look in the last page). 

I will add the references. Most of the first part of the article was from this source http://www.kroraina.com/casia/jablonskij.html. Source from electronic dictionary: http://www.slovopedia.com/2/207/250332.html Also note, that if there was a need for a "list of famous representatives of Pamir-Fergana race, than we have to add to that list all the famous people who were born in Central Asia in a period between the end of 1st millennium and until today. Instead there was an article about Gerasimov reconstructions, which is a word-to-word translation, which was deleted by David Straub and Dbachmann-users who make edits on the subjects they don’t know anything about…. Here are the sources: http://www.kunstkamera.ru/en/temporary_exhibitions/virtual/gerasimov/03/fields_of_application/reconstructing_the_appearance_of_historical_personalities/

http://files.school-collection.edu.ru/dlrstore/2380ecdf-6084-4267-ba89-043fef397472/Rudaki.htm

http://files.school-collection.edu.ru/dlrstore/fdcb1aee-405a-437f-beb7-7f74283e0dfd/Schachruch.htm

http://files.school-collection.edu.ru/dlrstore/f66df9c0-6d5d-44e0-b9e4-7b84d46bcdac/Ulugbek.htm

http://www.tatmir.ru/article.shtml?article=565&section=0&heading=57

Admin edited the article contributing: 1) minimum of information 2) false data, which makes wikipedia a source of disinformation. Admin Dbachmann claim this is "not arguable", based on that, I will not edit this article. All of the sources are in Russian and I hope anyone who can speak Russian or at least who can use Google Translator will read it and revert the edits made by Dbachmann, to the " 03:51, 11 April 2010 Math920" version +, in addition to the sources, will add the citations........ (talk) 03:42, 11 April 2010 (UTC))

I am sorry, but your article fails to meet the most basic requirements. I don't know about "Pamirid race", I have just seen that the Russian article says "англ. Pamirid". Since your first language appears to be Russian, perhaps you want to contribute to the Russian article, and we can then assist you in translation? I don't know why you are linking to random websites like kunstkamera.ru above. Perhaps you should read WP:RS? I submit that it is obvious that we are dealing with a topic of scientific racism here, as we are discussing the definition of a race in 1930s anthropological literature. --dab (𒁳) 07:11, 13 April 2010 (UTC)

The Pamirian race seems to be the same as Armenoid. Should maybe be merged. http://dienekes.110mb.com/texts/biasutticaucasoid/ FunkMonk (talk) 00:19, 8 May 2010 (UTC)

The photos for the two races do look the same and the scientific evidence for these separate races is on shaky ground, but the Pamirid race and Armenoid race are in geographically distinct regions (Central Asia and Middle East) and there is a large body of literature, mostly in Russian, about the Pamirid race. So I think it would be best to keep separate pages for the two articles. David Straub (talk) 01:24, 8 May 2010 (UTC)

Well, as long as this page just serves as a dumping-ground for Soviet era anthropological bibliography, it isn't really useful. We don't really profit from the knowledge that there is "a large body" of Soviet literature on this as long as we don't have a summary of what the gist of this literature turns out to be. --dab (𒁳) 10:30, 8 May 2010 (UTC)

---

I want to submit my "IMHO", and I do want to tell that never majored in history and am an amateur who read some sources. Pamiri-Ferghana race is an invention of Soviet scholarship. It came into being largely because of political reasons related to the Uzbeks. Soviet historians would mainly link the nation to the Shaibanids and thus classify us as strictly Mongoloid (which is try if we assume that Shaybanids would migrate en masse, which never happenned). Uzbek historians angered by this (usually pejorative elsewhere too at those times) appellation would dig into own sources trying to show (though not overtly) the link with ancient Iranians. At those times science of genetics was still a science fiction ... :) This Pamiri Ferghana race came to designate the mixture of Caucasian and Mongoloid traits Uzbeks exhibit to a varying degree. With Uzbeks it's important to remember that not every Uzbek belongs to the Mongoloid race and not every Caucasian is Uzbek. Pamiris stand apart from other Central Asian populations as having almost no outside gene contribution. They exhibit typical Caucasoid features and are related to their Tajik neighbours. (I'm really surprised to see that someone still cares about such outdated things.) --Sahib-qiron 16:30, 21 February 2011 (UTC) — Preceding unsigned comment added by Sahib-qiron (talk • contribs)