We and others have noticed and posted about a recurring phenomenon in academic papers. Authors, often Northern Italians, issue quibbling, hairsplitting papers about the "differences" in Italy. In each, they pretend to break new ground. As if Italy hasn't been studied enough. As if such themes had not been explored ad nauseam.
Nevermind that over a generation ago, legendary geneticist Luigi Luca Cavalli-Sforza, himself a (cough) proud Northern Italian, showed that there is more genetic distance and variation in any one village in Africa than there is in the entire continent of Europe -- We have yet another paper aiming to measure that Northern Italians and Southern Italians are different.
These papers wouldn't be so god-awful if they weren't by and large ignorant of history. They wouldn't be so god-awful if they didn't cherry pick which academic papers they cite. But because of both traits (a lack of historical knowledge, selective citation), they come across, as, well, having an agenda. When you realize that much of the research is NOT coming out of Southern Italy, you understand that any perspective that doesn't seek to "other" Southern Italians can get at best lost and at worst covered up.
Why do we say such papers are borderline racist. Two reasons. First of all, the world is a big place, and there are thousands of areas much less poorly studied than Italy. Instead of writing the fiftieth paper trying to point out differences among Italians, go study another part of the world. Secondly, Northern Italians often have a desire to explain why their Southern brethren are a little darker, a little less educated, etc. They don't do a deep dive into it (isolation, poor government). They don't grasp that for long periods in history, it was reversed: the South was where the smart people and commerce were. No, they just desire to show the world that Northern Italians are good Caucasians, and damn the southerners. Genetic hairsplitting is just the latest tool.
From this paper, "Through 40,000 years of human presence in Southern Europe: the Italian case study" comes some real gems of this theme.
Again, we and others have posted before two principles:
-For a millennia, Rome was an exporter of people. It sent colonies all around the Mediterranean, especially to places like Greece. Many of the genetic similarities are due to enormous Roman population growth and genetic outflow -- not the other way around.
-Recent studies have shown that Southern Italians are genetically more similar to the Romans than Northern Italians. Why? Well, the barbarian (Germanic) invasions were land-based. Unlike previous mass movements, they came by land. They came from continental Europe and moved south, instead of by sea, moving north. When the sea ceased to be the only superhighway, the south became a backwater. Thus, you may think of Northern Italians as Southern Italians, with a little bit of German blood.
Oh but despite these concrete principles, we get "studies" like this one, which rather than just relaying the DNA data, they delve into ahistorical speculation:
-Southern Italians appear "more Mediterranean," according to the paper. Hmm. DUH! Yes, the peninsula juts into the Mediterranean, while places like Milan, don't. But the authors say "this is probably" because of Greek influence. No! Southerners just don't have as much German influence.
-Then we get, drumroll please, a long tirade featuring the same tired cliches as every other stinking paper like this. "We don't know where the Etruscans came from." No, that has been solved. They were indigenous. "The Roman empire was cosmopolitan, in particular with emigrants from the Near East." No, there is absolutely nothing in history to back up the latter half of that statement. There is nothing in genetics to show that Roman slaves had offspring. And there is nothing to show that free immigrants from say, Egypt, were more numerous than free immigrants from Gaul or Britain.
-But the biggest stinker -- the biggest ahistorical statement of some time -- is the paper's notion that any serious genetic contribution can be attributed to the "Byzantines." Byzantium (The Eastern Roman Empire) could barely post garrisons in Southern Italy. Barely fight off the Lombards in Calabria. Barely hold any land, from all the different military countervailing forces, including Franks, Saracens, Normans, etc. The idea that there was mass population movement from east to west during a time of depopulation, plague, stagnation, and crisis, is something that no serious historian would ever assert.
What an awful piece of drivel.
Perhaps scientists like this would be best to take their own maxims:
-Don't discuss things you're not an expert on
-Try to DISprove a hypothesis. Don't just accept something as true.
-Be different. Don't conform. Put out something that truly breaks new ground.
This paper ain't it folks.
No comments:
Post a Comment