Ramirez Rozzi Fernando
UMR7206 Ecoanthropologie, MNHN, CNRS, UP, Musée de L'Homme, Paris, France; UR2496 Pathologies, Imagerie et biothérapies oro-faciales, UP, Montrouge, France,
J Anthropol Sci. 2023 Oct 20;101:171-183. doi: 10.4436/JASS.10020. Epub 2023 Aug 2.
Many people and organizations misunderstand the concept behind the name Pygmy. This misunderstanding leads them to misinterpretations and erroneous judgements about its use. This article goes back to the origin of the name in order to clarify the meaning that it has today, especially for the Pygmies themselves. The term 'pygmy' originated in ancient Greece where it was employed for a legendary people who, in Greek mythology, were engaged in an unceasing battle against cranes. Although the morphology of the pygmies described by the ancient Greeks cannot be fully characterized, the term 'pygmy' was used for centuries to refer to a population of small stature living close to the Nile. This led scientists and travellers in modern times to refer to populations of small stature living in equatorial Africa as pygmies. The distinction between Pygmies and non-Pygmies in this region matches the presence of two kinds of populations whose identities are defined in contraposition to one another by socio-cultural aspects. Genetic population studies have suggested that the Pygmies split from non-Pygmy populations around 60,000 years BP. Very importantly, the use of the name Pygmy is gratifying to the Pygmies themselves and it appears in the title of almost all Pygmy rights organizations. The name Pygmy thus covers populations sharing a particular phenotype, having a common origin and thus a biological identity, as well as socio-cultural characteristics which are diverse but nevertheless distinguish them from non-Pygmy populations. Furthermore, the name Pygmy has a dual function for the Pygmies themselves, at once asserting their common identity in contraposition to non-Pygmies ("Big-blacks" as they call them) and conveying their claims against those who despise them, who are the same "Big-blacks".
许多个人和组织误解了“俾格米人”这个名字背后的概念。这种误解导致他们对该词的使用产生错误解读和判断。本文追溯该名字的起源，以阐明其如今所具有的含义，尤其是对俾格米人自身而言的含义。“俾格米人”一词起源于古希腊，当时用于指一个传说中的民族，在希腊神话中，他们与鹤进行着无休止的战斗。尽管古希腊人所描述的俾格米人的形态特征无法完全确定，但“俾格米人”这个词在几个世纪里一直被用来指代生活在尼罗河附近身材矮小的人群。这使得近代的科学家和旅行者将生活在赤道非洲身材矮小的人群称为俾格米人。该地区俾格米人和非俾格米人的区分与两种人群的存在相匹配，这两种人群的身份在社会文化层面上相互对立。基因群体研究表明，俾格米人在距今约6万年前与非俾格米人群体分离。非常重要的是，“俾格米人”这个名字让俾格米人自己感到满意，并且几乎出现在所有俾格米人权利组织的名称中。因此，“俾格米人”这个名字涵盖了具有特定表型、共同起源因而具有生物学身份，以及具有多样但仍使其区别于非俾格米人群体的社会文化特征的人群。此外，“俾格米人”这个名字对俾格米人自身具有双重作用，既与非俾格米人（他们称之为“大黑人”）相对立地确立了他们的共同身份，又表达了他们对那些鄙视他们的人的诉求，而这些人正是同样的“大黑人”。
