Monday, June 29, 2009

Anglo-Saxon Apartheid, redux

by J J Cohen

About a million years ago (July of 2006 to be exact: so far back in the past that Stephanie Trigg's blog was new), Eileen Joy was a mere guest blogger at ITM, holding down the fort while I departed to Bermuda. One of her early posts carried the nonsensational nontabloidesque title of Anglo-Saxons Were Apartheid Racists!

Men whose genetic makeup is most similar to the residents of Frisia were apparently able to pass their genes to the men of contemporary England, while preventing indigenous British males from doing the same -- or so molecular archeology tells us. Since I posted recently about the fourth culture and humanities/science collaboration, I will also direct you to this interesting summation of the work that has been done in using genetics to come to a better understanding of British and English prehistory. The article bears the weirdly erroneous title of "Who Killed the Men of England?": really the piece is about how the British were made to vanish by those who became the men of England.

5 comments:

This old world is a new world said...

Hi Eileen, How old does this post make you feel?

Eileen Joy said...

Stephanie: it's so weird that you write this because, actually, it kind of *did* make me feel old, but do you know what else it made me feel [?]: how lucky and blessed I was to stumble upon this weblog [thanks to Betsy McCormick, who told me in 2006 to read it] and to have Jeffrey as a friend and co-conspirator.

This old world is a new world said...

Yes, my dear Pollyanna, I knew you would turn this to the good. And I don't mind feeling a bit old, actually. Better than to be like that poor thing Michael Jackson, "unable to cross the threshold into manhood" (see Germaine Greer in The Guardian, making sense for once):

http://www.guardian.co.uk/music/2009/jun/26/michael-jackson-death-in-la

Eileen Joy said...

My dear Stephanie, that Greer essay is amazing; I quibble only with her assertion that Madonna can neither sing nor dance. I will confess I love Madonna and have all of her CDs. I am not ashamed. I have listened to "Hard Candy" so many times on my iTouch that the image of the cover art is flickering and fading.

As to being a Pollyanna, it is more that I am Pippi Longstocking with a dash of Mary Poppins. There are worse things in life. Cheers!

As to growing up, let us age but not grow up. Our child selves never leave us, although they are often locked away in lonely rooms where they await our re-discovery of them.

Eileen Joy said...

Or, if we are to grow up and enjoy the things only our adult selves can enjoy and value, let us do it side by side with the child still in us, because we need that sense of wonder.