Final answer:
The American Anthropological Association views race as a social construct rather than a biologically identifiable category. They emphasize the impact of social perceptions of race on society and reject biological explanations of racial categories. Biological anthropology supports this by showing extensive genetic diversity within populations that were once categorized racially.
Step-by-step explanation:
The American Anthropological Association's current stance on the concept of race is that biological explanations of race are unfounded. Instead, the association aligns with the perspective that race is a social construct and not biologically identifiable. The development of racial categories was based on pseudoscience and used to support racist practices, which is now a rejected viewpoint in anthropology. Research has illustrated that human traits like skin color, facial features, and hair texture do not conform to the discrete racial categories previously believed. Genetic markers for these traits are too few and inconsistent to accurately define race biologically. Biological anthropology has demonstrated that there is more genetic variation within these so-called racial groups than between them, making the biological division of people into races scientifically untenable.
Furthermore, the association acknowledges that race, while not existing biologically, still has a significant impact socially. Notions of race continue to shape individual lives and societal structures, contributing to inequality and discrimination. This duality points to the importance of understanding race from an integrated sociocultural and biological perspective, addressing issues such as racial inequality. The American Association of Biological Anthropologists (formerly the American Association of Physical Anthropologists) has also distanced itself from its past focus on racial typologies, now emphasizing the study of human evolution and the biological diversity of humans without framing it in terms of race.