Also, it's good to keep in mind that African People are sort of like Native American People (and European People and Asian People too), in the respect that there are many different tribes and we all have a different look. For instance, to a Cherokee, there's no way that a Sioux "looks like us". A Navajo and a Yakima look completely different. I'm not talking about traditional clothing. I'm talking about bone structure, body build, coloring, even the way we walk and talk. It's pretty easy to spot an Italian or an Irish person by their skin coloring and build too. It's easy to say someone "looks" like they come from an entire continent of course, but if you look a little deeper, you'll see that within the continents, exists true herititary traits. African's (actually from Africa) come in many, many shades. bj whitaker@innova.net wrote: The standard anthropological assumption is that blacks in the U.S. average only 30% black African ancestry: I think, that between U.S. blacks who "look African" [I worked with a lady who had an eerie physical resemblance to one of the African extras in the second Romancing the Stone movie.] and U.S. blacks who would have "passed" 50 years ago, that's a reasonable assumption. I've also noticed regional differences in black appearance: for example, I had many black co-workers in the D.C. area who were very light -- they were always from families with long histories in the D.C. area -- and others who were very dark -- they were always either born in the Carolinas or Alabama or their parents had been. --------------------------------- Do you Yahoo!? Free Pop-Up Blocker - Get it now