Typology (anthropology)
From The Art and Popular Culture Encyclopedia
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In some societies, color terminology are or were used in racial classifications. They have been used both popularly, as skin color is one of the most obvious physical traits of humans, and in earlier theories, which attempted to provide a rigorous definition of race. Although modern science has disqualified such attempts of classification, considered as racist pseudo-science, they have remained popular ways of depicting human variations. Scientific racism theories themselves progressively substituted other traits instead of human skin tone in their attempts to classify, in particular through the use of craniometry and others disciplines of physical anthropology.
Other scientists were more cautious about such categorisation, and Charles Darwin argued that the number of categories, or in this case the number of different colors, is completely arbitrary and subjective. For example, some claimed three distinct colors, some four, and others have claimed even more. In contrast, Darwin argued that there are gradations, or degrees between the numbers of categories claimed, and not distinct categories, or colors.
