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Julian Cope presents Head Heritage

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National Geographic and Celts
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gorseddphungus
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Mar 17, 2006, 23:34
Absolutely. Things in archaeology are extremely complex, we tend to forget we are dealing with human beings, sex, ritual, movements and things of that sort. The fact that archaeologists tried to view migrations as entirely separate entities, obviously attempting to categorize 'people', shows how backward things have been until recently. And these 'categories' in the hands of rulers become propaganda and even get stuck to the minds of the intellectuals for years. It has happened in all countries of the world. Countries were seen as empty places that accommodated one or two migrations the most (ideally autonomous and keeping their cultural-ethnic uniqueness intact), and on TOP of that, those migrants THEMselves were always regarded as *homogenous* groups of people. To go back to an earlier example, until recently the Irish were believed to be a Celtic people. Then it wasnt that clear, now if you want to be really Irish, it seems you have to reject your 'Celtic' roots. Clearly the word 'celtic' has become as undefinable as the word 'european'. I always smile when someone, say, from the US, to pick out a common cliche, say they are of Irish descent because of their surname. Reality is that if we could analyze every single surname that we have ever had (back to the early middle ages), we would each probably already depict quite a vast spectrum of the human race. Genealogy of only one surname is therefore an illusion, as it is only a tiny percentage of your origins which you have acquired by chance.

But to go back to the point of your post, yes, America MUST have received far more strands of cultural input and human influx than archaeologists can even attempt to glimpse.
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Re: daniken (PeterH)
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