How many human races are there in the world?

Different human skintones

That is a very interesting question. Just to clarify things a little, we need to understand what the term race actually means. Race refers to a species as a whole rather than to subdivisions of one creature. So, the term human race literally refers to humans as a whole regardless of skin tone, hair type, eye colour and so on. The whole races thing was developed back in the day when people were placed into strict categories according to their skin tones in order to justify slavery and segregation. Those of European ancestries were highly favoured over those with other backgrounds. The answer to how many human races there are in the world is one. Genetic studies have revealed that all human ethnic groups share the same DNA, the only difference being the level of genetic input from different ethnic groups that surround them. The term ethnic group refers to a subdivision of humans who belong to a certain language family, inhabit a certain area or region, possess a set of physical traits adapted for their habitat and have a distinct culture and way of life. To illustrate, you can think of the Bantu’s and the Khoisan of Africa. The Bantu people tend to be medium height in stature to rather tall, they also possess muscular, robust frames compared to other populations on the continent. They tend to have kinky (coily), sometimes peppercorn hair with wide noses (with the exception of East African Bantus who have medium wide noses), medium to dark brown complexions, sometimes black as seen in some of the Central Bantus. The Khoisan on the other hand tend to be short with lean, light builds, medium brown skin with a yellow tint with wide to very wide noses, monolid eyes and weak prognathy. This is just one comparison of how ethnic group does not equal race but rather just highlights the diversity human beings have and the genetic variation which showers our race. I hope this helped.

Various skin tones, one race