| Hmong phenotypes | |
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| Tweet Topic Started: Aug 25 2009, 07:36:55 PM (1,003 Views) | |
| black man | Aug 25 2009, 07:36:55 PM Post #1 |
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Hmong-Mien can be put into two different categories according to classic averaged anthropometric values, one being long-headed and broad-faced, the other being short-headed and narrow-faced. Neither of these seem to be particularly high-faced. Rather the opposite. I.e., they're supposedly short-faced or have an intermediate facial height. The short-headed, narrow-faced average type can be found among certain Tai-Kadai-speakers as well. So the small-faced and small-headed Hmong-Mien populations could have Tai-Kadai-speaking ancestors who were linguistically assimilated by Hmong-Mien-speakers. The more big-faced and big-headed Hmong-Mien populations might have retained more markedly "northern" phenotypes. As Woo notes, his broad-faced Guizhou Miao sample mostly contains people with just "medium brown" eyes "lighter than [those] of most southern Chinese" and "pale yellow" skin (Woo, p. 53). I think, there is kind of thick light-yellowish skin which makes some northern Han (Shandong Han in particular) and southern Koreans different from most North Asians. It might be found among the broad-faced Miao as well, I'm unsure about this. In any case, I don't think that the yellowish skin among the more narrow-faced Miao is the same as in NE Han and southern Koreans. As far as I can judge, the more narrow-faced Hmong-Mien tend to have a different skin quality (even in case that their skin is light-yellowish, too) because their skin makes their faces look quite bony. Judging from the morphs I made, I'd guess that that the big-faced Hmong-Mien tend to have pentagonal (and, to a lesser extent, square) faces with less conspicuous cheekbones, while the small-faced Hmong-Mien tend to have more "triangular" faces with laterally conspicuous cheekbones (like certain Tai-Kadai populations). Unfortunately, I could not confirm my idea via many morphs, though. I just found (mostly female) pictures of SE Asian Red Miao (reported to be long-headed and broad-faced by von Eickstedt) and SE Asian Black Miao, who seem to be more narrow-faced. Some more random information on Miao-Yao anthroposcopy found in literature: Mongol fold: mildly developed in aboout 50% of Li Hui's Guangxi Rongshui Cao (grass) Hmong and not at all in about 20% of them. According to Pi Jianhui in "湖南苗族、侗族头面部10 项形态特征研究" (2006), Hunan Miao have the same amount of incisor shovelling like Hunan Dong: about 60%. Their eyebrows tend to be sparser than those of the latter though. Also, the middle of the Hunan Miao male nose is less convex than that of the Hunan Dong male (about 30% vs about 40%). This is also less than in Li Hui's Cao Hmong males (about 50%). Some earlier (probably more or less Nordicist) accounts: Stuebel 1954 - location: Quanfu village in Anning district to the west of Kunming - estimated height: men: 155-160cm; women: 135-150cm - hair: black and stiff; significantly lighter in children, occasionally even almost blond, darkens in the first years - face: rounder than in the Tai, Annamites and Chinese; cheekbones less prominent than in Tai and Annamites; weak Mongol fold, eyes mostly horizontal; nose short, mostly concave, chin round, thick lips - femininity: early maturation, curvy, look 50 to 60 at age 30 - looks: half-length head hair in men; wash rarely, shave, beard growth "sparse like in the Chinese"; men older than 40 are allowed to grow beards; as two of the photos confirm, beard growth does occur (once a strong chin beard, once a full beard) though maybe just relatively lately and a bit sparser than in Westerners Rheinwald 1942 - Hei Miao near Shihping: thin chin beard and moustache - Hua Miao near 贵 定 Guiding: long face, steep forehead, broad, flat nose, nose "length" (since he previously wrote "flat", he probably meant nose height") varies; "thick, almost negroid lips", eyes horizontal or moderately slanted, Mongol fold - Hainan Miao: pluck out beard - Guizhou Miao: moustache and chin beard relatively common - "hinterland" Yao: "almost white skin colour", greyish and "water blue" eyes, head hair "often light, even blond"; otherwise, more or less black, convex(?) nose; pluck out beard, half-length head hair in men, culture of hot bath How would you describe the Hmong phenotypes in comparison those of other ethnic groups? Some people consider them to be "similar" to Koreans... http://www.flickr.com/photos/napix/2202950783/ http://www.flickr.com/photos/napix/2202951919/ http://www.flickr.com/photos/napix/2214935439/ ![]() ![]() ![]()
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| ren | Aug 27 2009, 05:58:48 AM Post #2 |
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The ones I saw in America, from Laos, do appear to be similar to Koreans. The ones I see online appear to be pedamorphic and slightly SE Asian, atleast Tai-Kadai, atleast the girls. The ones I saw in Western Hunan appear northern Chinese. |
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| DaoMai | Sep 28 2010, 11:28:47 PM Post #3 |
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First pic looks like Yao/Mien folks from Vietnam based on their look and their clothes. The ones I see from China tend to have larger eyes. |
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| ren | Sep 29 2010, 12:04:32 AM Post #4 |
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The stereotype in China of Hmong is like this. Face shape very similar to more southern peoples but skin and eyes not..
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| luxemen | Jul 6 2018, 03:04:50 PM Post #5 |
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I've only met like 5 Hmong people in my life. They don't strike me as being very Korean (most), but those that do, they can pass as Korean better than many other Chinese ethnic groups in my honest opinion, including some Han Chinese. I should clarify though that I find that they superficially overlap mostly with the rather commonly found Mongolian-looking Koreans, rather than the distinct Korean/Japanese (Yayoi) looking Koreans though, since Koreans also have many different types (which I will open a new thread about). I also don't find many Hmong looking like this Korean man, aside from the Northeast Chinese, which I find to be a very characteristic Korean-tungusic look: ![]() ![]() Also this guy has that distinct Yayoi look I was talking about that is specific to Korea/Japan, but also pulled more towards Tungusic: Edited by luxemen, Jul 6 2018, 03:08:39 PM.
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| black man | Jul 7 2018, 03:48:23 AM Post #6 |
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Thanks for the reply, luxemen. When compared with other ethnographic groups in southern East Asia, Hmong are among those who have the largest heads and faces. Also, their y and mtDNA hg profiles can be interpreted as indicating relatively recent gene flow/s from north to south. Typologically, it is possible to distinguish between "more northern" and "more southern" looks. Nevertheless, I so far never came across any pictures of particularly "northern" Hmong women in terms of facial size. Rather, I'd say, it's possible to find pictures of northern Han women whose faces seem to be intermediate in between those of non-Han northern East Asians and Hmong. So I guess, Hmong have kind of northern East Asian ancestry. But it's not from any present-day northern ethnic group. And there might have been a reduction of typological diversity to the extent that it had some impact on sexual dimorphism, which might have increased due to patriarchal social organisation in more warlike parts of the world.
Cheboksarov would possibly classify him as "Koreano-Manchurian" maybe judging from the data and photos of "Dongbei" Koreans known to him. On fig. 7 of his book on Chinese physical anthropology there is a Korean whose face is all in all relatively similar but whose cheekbones are more narrow. There seems to be a relative lack of typological continuity in Hebei and Shandong. But the facial proportions seem to be more common in Jiangsu Han fishermen and maybe also farmers of certain regions within Jiangsu. However, in Zhejiang (i.e., to the south of Jiangsu) people already start to look more like SE Asians. And, as already mentioned elsewhere, to the west of Hebei, Shandong and Jiangsu, people tend to look more like Tibeto-Burmans.
There are facially similar people in Korea, Japan and a region which could be called "Manchuria". But there seems to be a moderate to marked discontinuity in Sino-Tibetan-speaking regions. Interestingly, men in Hebei and Shandong are often typologically similar to Koreans and Japanese from western Honshuu. But women appear to be typologically more in between this type and a small-faced type (as indicated in the first part of this post above). However, Tibeto-Burman-speakers of both sexes can be more similar to the "original type" again though all in all very rarely (as you indicated concerning Hmong). So it will be complicated to reconstruct who mixed with whom the more the distance from Korea increases. Few people know about the history of some of those regions which it concerns, not to mention the prehistory. As for "Manchuria", one can at least clarify that the homeland of Evenk material culture can be counted as less interesting in this context. Similarly, the aborigines of inland North Asia to the northeast to Lake Baikal were originally very different in terms of y and mtDNA hg profiles and phenotypes though they should be mentioned in the context of Nivkh mtDNA and y hg profiles and physical anthropology, two topics potentially relevant when one talks about the possibility of contributions of different "Palaeo-Asiatic" peoples to Korean gene pools. What do you already know about the Tibeto-Burman-speaking regions? Maybe we can approach Tibeto-Burman topics from a perspective with which are already familiar and then discuss them more efficiently. |
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