mongrelism
nounEtymology From mongrel + -ism.
1
The condition of being a mongrel.
- It is, however, quite possible, and perhaps probable, that the brown Polynesians were originally the produce of a mixture of Malays, or some lighter coloured Mongol race with the dark Papuans; but if so, the intermingling took place at such a remote epoch, and has been so assisted by the continued influence of physical conditions and of natural selection, leading to the preservation of a special type suited to those conditions, that it has become a fixed and stable race with no signs of mongrelism, and showing such a decided preponderance of Papuan character, that it can best be classified as a modification of the Papuan type.1869, Alfred Russel Wallace, The Malay Archipelago, volume II, London: Macmillan and Co., page 455:
2
cross-breeding or hybridization
- Related terms
- mongrelize