Dr Mae Jemison's Chinese Ancestry

I was totally surprised by this, Although she obviously has some asiatic features, I never in my life thought it was borne out of mixing between blacks and asians in the south. I always thought that the Asian migration only managed to penetrated the west and midwest and no more. Wow what a great program, very enlightening. I find it funny that the head of african American studies at Harvard has much more in common with Europeans than with Africans. This kind of facts just shows how ridiculous the concept of "race" is as the ultimate definition of character in the U.S. and much of the slave owning west is, yet how much power it has been given and is still being given in our society today.

It isn't that rare. During the 1800s in the North, Irish, black and Chinese people all lived together as equals. I always thought I was Irish and had my DNA tested after seeing this show. Turns out I'm Chinese, too.

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That is interesting. Although she does look somewhat Asian. IIRC she relates that when she was working in South East Asia one of her local coworkers said that she looked just like a cousin of his.

I hadn't thought about coolie labor at the time. There were also your odd East Asians here and there who made their way into the Eastern US prior to the large influx in the late 19th century. Most of them were men who were picked up as crew by American sailing vessels visiting Asia. There's an interesting book called New York Before Chinatown, which deals with Asians and American ideas about Asia up through the establishment of a significant Asian community in New York.

"Unless Alpert's covered in bacon grease, I don't think Hugo can track anything."