sophie
Break My Heart
doble posto
History Questions Not Worth Their Own Thread VII
- Thread starter Plotinus
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sophie
Break My Heart
jackelgull
An aberration of nature
Does anyone know why convict leasing ended around World War II? It seems like it was an immensely profitable system, so why did it die out, especially before the Civil Right's Movement?
Louis XXIV
Le Roi Soleil
Because it was highly controversial and tied to images of government corruption. Wikipedia mentions the Martin Talbert case, which was a high enough profile incident to spur on action in some states.
It should be noted that even during (and for a decade or two after) the Great War horses were a key element of military thought - albeit as logistical tools. A horse or mule pulling or carrying something is much easier to maintain, requires the carrying of far less 'fuel' and is able to traverse much more difficult terrain than any motor vehicle available at the time. On another note, men trained as cavalrymen have always been employed as infantry when the situation demands it - from knights who lost their horses, to dragoons and even modern armoured troops who end up on foot patrols. During the Great War, the British Household Cavalry were converted into machine-gun regiments.
Domen
Misico dux Vandalorum
Or knights attacking / defending castles.
Spoiler :
sophie
Break My Heart
Best post you've made in years, mate.
The US Army still uses the term 'cavalry' for some units. The mission is still there. It's the horse that's gone missing. Now they use helicopters or armored personnel carriers. Horses have been used in other missions since the Great War, as you noted. Sometimes they represented a lack of other forms of transport, and sometimes they represented transport in terrain in which other forms of transport just wouldn't work. I don't recall what happened to it, but I once had a book with a picture of, I think it was Merrill's Marauders with soldiers struggling to get horses over muddy trails.
Some horses saw service in the Vietnam war. Some see service in the Afghan war now. http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2014/06/22/horses-marines-afghanistan/10744395/
But even though the horse hasn't entirely disappeared from warfare, it can't serve the purpose it once did.
There were cavalry charges by local allies during the US invasion of Afghanistan, and there are almost certainly cavalry charges in the ethnic conflicts taking place in Sudan and other African conflict zones, so no, the horse certainly hasn't entirely outlived its usefulness in warfare.
My question: Is there any example of a state having its dominant ethnicity changed purely by migration? Not forced migration, such as in the conquest and colonisation of Australia, but more along the lines of the irrational fears of Western states being "overrun" by Muslim migrants?
I read an analysis today that said Chinese migration to Australia would eventually make Australia majority-Chinese if it continued to grow at the same rate while birth-rates and non-Chinese migration continued to drop (the author was not seriously proposing such a possibility, but was actually using it to make a point on some of the statistical stupidity in Australia's recent Inter-Generational Report, which has been blasted by everyone in Australia outside of the government which released it) which inspired this question. I've seen documentaries on Australian television in the past that propose the Anglo-Saxon conquest of Britain was more of a long-term, peaceful migration, but I don't know the veracity of that claim.
My question: Is there any example of a state having its dominant ethnicity changed purely by migration? Not forced migration, such as in the conquest and colonisation of Australia, but more along the lines of the irrational fears of Western states being "overrun" by Muslim migrants?
I read an analysis today that said Chinese migration to Australia would eventually make Australia majority-Chinese if it continued to grow at the same rate while birth-rates and non-Chinese migration continued to drop (the author was not seriously proposing such a possibility, but was actually using it to make a point on some of the statistical stupidity in Australia's recent Inter-Generational Report, which has been blasted by everyone in Australia outside of the government which released it) which inspired this question. I've seen documentaries on Australian television in the past that propose the Anglo-Saxon conquest of Britain was more of a long-term, peaceful migration, but I don't know the veracity of that claim.
ParkCungHee
Deity
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There definitely was a longer term peaceful migration but the bulk of change with the arrival of the Anglo-Saxons was simply a dominant conquering culture arriving and it was personally useful for most people to learn the language as a means of accessing power, similar to the spread of Arabic throughout Africa.
As for your example, I think the most direct examples I can think of would be most of what we think of as "China."
Manchuria, for example, was made mostly Chinese through peaceful migration.
As for your example, I think the most direct examples I can think of would be most of what we think of as "China."
Manchuria, for example, was made mostly Chinese through peaceful migration.
Aren't the Manchurians as much descendants of the old Manchu as Han Chinese though? I had quite a few Chinese friends at university, and the only one from Manchuria was considerably taller and had very different facial features to the others. I understand I'm committing the cardinal sin of generalising about a population based on a single individual here, but it's not like people of any ethnicity wear signs advertising their proximate origins.
I discussed this with a friend just an hour or so ago that told me "Portugal is half-black today" because of immigration, but I'm sure that's more a result of the Portuguese bringing black people back from their trips to Africa, than peaceful migration. I also think he was massively exaggerating that ratio, though this guy is so dead-pan it's impossible to tell when he's lying or being honest.
ParkCungHee
Deity
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Well, apparently the population of Manchuria increased from 1 million to 14 million in the span of 150 years, primarily because of Chinese Immigration.
Louis XXIV
Le Roi Soleil
The problem is the scarcity of sources for a lot of these events combined with a lot of assumptions. Anglo-Saxon migration was thought to have completely replaced the initial population. Now, backed by DNA testing, many are extremely skeptical of that idea. Arab conquests of the Middle East fall under that pattern as well. Everyone says they are Arab, but whether they came from the Arabian peninsula or descended from local populations is difficult to determine.
I'm going to go with the Bantu migrations. It was a long time ago, but the pockets of Khoisan peoples lend credence to the idea that they were cut off and isolated. Of course, it could be part of the same debate as well if people cared as much to debate it (or had the resources to DNA test sub-Saharan Africa).
I'm going to go with the Bantu migrations. It was a long time ago, but the pockets of Khoisan peoples lend credence to the idea that they were cut off and isolated. Of course, it could be part of the same debate as well if people cared as much to debate it (or had the resources to DNA test sub-Saharan Africa).
Traitorfish
The Tighnahulish Kid
What parts of China were the others from? If people from Manchuria have one "look" and people from Canton another, that probably say more about the two thousand-odd miles between them than about any clear difference between Han and Manchu peoples. You'd have to establish that people living just below Manchuria looked more like people in the far South than they did like people in Manchuria to even start drawing conclusions about a uniquely Manchu inheritance.
Chukchi Husky
Lone Wolf
I keep being told that DNA evidence proves that the Anglo-Saxons did completely replace the native British population.
People whose ancestors had been born on the British islands for generations might have started calling themselves 'Anglo-Saxons' for reasons of politics, prestige or simply out of confusion, but that's not the same thing. Louis has raised exactly the same happening with 'Arabs', and it certainly happened all over the place in Classical times with 'Romans' and 'Greeks' springing up from families that had never lived in 'Greece' or 'Rome'. One of my favourite examples of this is the Spanish inscriptions dedicated in terms like 'given by Marcus Flavius Mucius, son of Bilinos' - where the son but not the father had taken a Roman name, and the 'shift' from 'Spanish' to 'Roman' self-image is captured at a single moment.
Louis XXIV
Le Roi Soleil
Well, there are three possibilities: One of us heard wrong, one of us has an unreliable source, or the evidence is subject to multiple interpretations. It wouldn't surprise me if three is true. If so, that raises a lot of concerns if it's subject to two entirely opposite interpretations. I know there are plenty of skeptics to the value of DNA evidence (I for one find it an intriguing avenue to explore).
On the specific topic, I'm skeptical of a complete replacement of a population. I don't think even the most extreme version thinks that. But the debate is about the replacement of language and culture that seemed to have occurred. There are no good sources to shed light on it, so you're left with archaeology and DNA as the two best paths.
Traitorfish
The Tighnahulish Kid
As far as I know, the strongest population replacement we know about in the UK is in the Northern Isles, and even then you're looking at only around 25-30% of a population that wasn't likely to exceed ten thousand.
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