Canadian First Nations Discovered America in 12,000 BC or 35,000 BC
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Old political cartoon referencing moving Native Americans back to the West during and after the American Civil War (public domain).
Original Discovery and Secondary Discovery
In 2009, I've noticed a substantial number of articles, both professional and opinion, about the discovery of what we call "The New World" and "America." At the same time, the three-pronged partnership of IBM, The Smithsonian Institution, and National Geographic in the Genographic Project has nearly connected up all the genetic evidence for the actual migration of humans from their origins to the ends of the earth - specifically, the Western Hemisphere and finally,Greenland and Iceland.
Like it not, all human are related, divergent only along certain lines, and racial differences are statistically insignificant, according to the Project findings. Surprising links were found among a sample of New Yorkers in a televised segment, many participants related to racial or ethnic subgroups they had never imagined would be their kin.
Foolish things to confound the wise, indeed.
All the dots around the globe are not yet fully connected, and the Project strives onward into the future.
Certain questions remain:
- DNA and human migration research from the 1970s has not been fully examined - Did an African group actually migrate to Wales and proceed to the vicinity of Stonehenge? Did they, as the book claims, bring with them stones they cut for the construction by way of rollers? A text from the 1970s traced blood types found in Africa and Wales, other genetic materials, and records of artifacts and other signs of human migration from Africa to Wales in a book called The Black Irish and it needs to be re-examined. Interestingly, in Richard Webber's The Welsh Diaspora: Analysis of the geography of Welsh names we see that a significant percentage of African Americans have Welsh surnames, when the Welsh rarely owned slaves in America. This suggests Africans living in Wales of old.
- Why do Indigenous Peoples most often name themselves only "The People" or other denotations such as The People That Were Always Here, The First People, The First and Only People, and similar? Have they forgotten their long-ago migration history or have people instantaneously appeared in several places at once at origin?
- Are the Basque in France and Spain related to anyone else at all?
- What about the New Zealand group that was found initially (in 2005) by National Geographic and the Smithsonian Human Genome Project to be unrelated to other humans?
- Did certain ethnic groups, such as some peoples of New Zealand migrate in circles and go back to whence they came, or did they move on?
Other questions remain, but one certain fact remains.
Vikings, Christopher Columbus, Americus Vespucius, the Portuguese/Italian/Spanish, the French, the English - none of the like discovered America. There were others already here. They discovered it for their own people, but not firstly.
The Chinese did not discover the land between 1000 - 1500 AD, either -- they were indeed part northern Asian groups that came across around 12,000 - 10,000 BC or even as early as 53,000 - 40,000 BC accprding to some archeological evidence.
These first peoples to migrate comprised northern Asians that became Canada's First Nations and "Eskimos" (Innuits, et.al.) and the US Pacific Northwest's Native Americans and "Eskimos." These peoples fanned out into the New World and mixed with others that came across the Pacific and Atlantic later in history. The Creole people are distinctly well-mixed and beautiful, for instance.
Africa and the Middle East
"You Can Run, But You Can't Hide"
There is no dodging this point: northern Asians were first. Later ethnic groups discovered the New World for their own countries, but not for the first time overall. Indigenous People count for something and they discovered the New World first. This should be acknowledged in children's textbooks. It would be well to acknowledge it in Sunday School and church as well, because Christ was part Israeli and part African - at the very least. He was not white, nor 100% Black as some claim.
Much propaganda pointed to the Yellow Peril of Asia in the first half of the 20th Century and some of it has never died. However, some folks do not want to be related to any other races at all and if they are, will not admit the fact. I think it is a non-issue that should die. Despite contrariwise evidence, some folks claim Indigenous Peoples don't count as people and can't possibly be related to themselves. I know people right now that are hiding their ethnic heritages, because they feel ashamed of them. I hope one day, these injustices pass.
One side effect of advancing technologies and shrinking global distances and communication times is that we are finding many more connections than in previous centuries. Some of them are surprising, and not everyone enjoys them.
The Genographic Project and mitochondrial DNA trace humans to Africa, while some churches trace them to Iraq, where they feel the Garden of Eden originated. While it is a standard human and investigations error that people want to connect up everything, even things that are not connected, it seems relatively sure that humans originated in Africa or in Africa close to the Middle East and spread out through migration. The Tower of Babel was the site of the confusion/differentiation of langauges and/or they changed over time and distance. People migrated; otherwise, different groups of humankind sprang up independently.
Native Americans did not hatch indpendently -- Their genetic material, except for one marker, exists elsewhere. Even their metabolic handling of beverage alcohol is the same as that of the Chinese and other Asian groups, but different from that of whites and of Blacks.
Perhaps Europeans stumbled onto the Western Hemisphere in their quest for new resources for their own peoples, but none of them discovered the North, Central, and South American Continents for humankind proper. By the way, The Northwest Passage was at last completely open as of 2008, proof available in NASA satellite photos. Perhaps we can finally use that route for a few years until it refreezes - we as people searched for it for so long.
Fear of Genocide
While genetic connections are interesting, they are useful for tracing possible diseases and hereditary conditions for oursevles as well as our children, grandchildren, and additional generations down the line. These connections can lead to research that can result in a cure for some of them, so they are important.
Anyone that wishes to prove or disprove racial and ethnic lineage can do so pretty thoroughly with genetic testing, although it is likely not 100% accurate. Some prefer simply not to know.
The reasons for hiding ethnicity are incomprehensible to me at this date. During WWII, one could be slaughtered for Israeli heritage, for example. Some ethnic groups around the world tpday are targeted for destruction via genocide in warts. Perhaps all humankind fears this down to our roots of survival.
