So I was reading my Anthropology textbook the other day and came upon a weird fact.... there is such a thing as a lactase-negative race. I've heard that lactose intolerance is the way humans are really supposed to be and that it is often genetic (that I can attest to... my mom, grandma, two cousins and aunts are also lactose intolerant). But that it can depend on your ethnicity!?! That was definitely something new.
According to "Applying Cultural Anthropology: An Introductory Reader," we can define a race by their ability to digest milk. Seriously. I promise I am not making this up. Most northern and central Europeans, Arabians and West Africans are able to digest lactose. Most southern Europeans (well up until now I had no reason to regret my Italian and Spanish heritage), East Asians, American Indians, Australians and Africans are in the "lactase-negative race."
Of course we all start out with the lactase enzyme, as infants it is necessary to digest milk. Up until 6,000 years ago, nearly all humans lost the ability to digest milk after they stopped nursing. So then why are lactose tolerant people considered normal!? Technically they are the ones that should be weird. But I guess 6,000 years of adaptation allows humans to completely change some of their lesser abilities (we're not talking about learning to fly or anything), leaving some of us lesser races behind in our ability to digest certain things.
Who would have thought... lactose intolerance caused by our race. It seems a bit ironic that my ethnicity (by the way... all my family members with lactose intolerance are on my mother's Italian and Spanish side), which is known for pizza and mozzarella and calzone and cannoli and the hundreds of other things I can no longer eat, is also the reason that I can no longer eat their delicious cuisine.
Your blog was very insightful. I should be on the lactose intolerant side because of my Filipino ethnicity. I am the first generation to be born and raised in the states along with all my cousins and we are all lactose tolerant. However, the older generations (our mothers,fathers, aunts, and uncles) who have immigrated from the Philippines are lactose intolerant. I have asked my parents about this before and they answered that milk from cattle was never in their diet. They drank a lot of goat and caribou milk but milk from cattle was a rarity, since cattle is not as prevalent there as they are in the states. I don't know how accurate they may be, but it could have something to do with it.
ReplyDeleteVery interesting. I had known about the ethnicity of lactose intolerance but have similar questions as you. Why in the world are the most lactose intolerant people the ones that add the most cheese to their diet? And how did lactose tolerance develop and become so prevalent?
ReplyDelete