The evolution of cultural diversity : a phylogenetic approach

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書誌事項

The evolution of cultural diversity : a phylogenetic approach

edited by Ruth Mace, Clare J. Holden and Stephen Shennan

UCL Press , Cavendish Pub., c2005

  • pbk.

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注記

Includes bibliographical references (p. [257]-288) and index

内容説明・目次

内容説明

Virtually all aspects of human behaviour show enormous variation both within and between cultural groups, including material culture, social organization and language. Thousands of distinct cultural groups exist: about 6,000 languages are spoken today, and it is thought that a far greater number of languages existed in the past but became extinct. Using a Darwinian approach, this book seeks to explain this rich cultural variation. There are a number of theoretical reasons to believe that cultural diversification might be tree-like, that is phylogenetic: material and non-material culture is clearly inherited by descendants, there is descent with modification, and languages appear to be hierarchically related. There are also a number of theoretical reasons to believe that cultural evolution is not tree-like: cultural inheritance is not Mendelian and can indeed be vertical, horizontal or oblique, evidence of borrowing abounds, cultures are not necessarily biological populations and can be transient and complex. Here, for the first time, this title tackles these questions of cultural evolution empirically and quantitatively, using a range of case studies from Africa, the Pacific, Europe, Asia and America. A range of powerful theoretical tools developed in evolutionary biology are used to test detailed hypotheses about historical patterns and adaptive functions in cultural evolution. Evidence is amassed from archaeological, linguist and cultural datasets, from both recent and historical or pre-historical time periods. A unifying theme is that the phylogenetic approach is a useful and powerful framework, both for describing the evolutionary history of these traits, and also for testing adaptive hypotheses about their evolution and co-evolution. Contributors include archaeologists, anthropologists, evolutionary biologists and linguists, and this book will be of great interest to all those involved in these areas.

目次

  • 1 Introduction: a phylogenetic approach to the evolution of genetic diversity
  • R.Mace
  • PART ONE: 2 How Tree-like is Cultural Evolution
  • C.J.Holder, S.Shennan
  • 3 Testing Population Dispersal Hypotheses: Pacific settlement phylogenetic trees and Austronesia languages
  • S.J.Greenhill, R.D.Gray
  • 4 Compariosn of Maximum Parsimony and Bayesian Bangtu Language Trees
  • C.J.Holden, A.Meade, M.Pagel
  • 5 Untangling our Past: languages, trees, splits and networks
  • D.Bryant, F.Filimon, R.D.Gray
  • 6 Cultural Phylogenetic Hypotheses in Archaeology: some fundamental issues
  • M.J.O'Brien, R.L.Lyman
  • 7 Phylogenesis versus Ethnogenesis in Turkmen Cultural Evolution
  • M.Collard, J.Tehrani
  • 8 Investigating Processes of Cultural Evolution on the North Coast of New Guinea with Multivariate and Cladistic Analyses
  • S.Shennan, M.Collard
  • 9 Cultural Transmission in Indigenous California
  • P.Jordan, S.Shennan
  • PART TWO: 10 On the Use of Phylogenetic Comparative Methods to Test Co-evolutionary Hypotheses across Cultures
  • R.Mace
  • 11 The Evolution of Human Sex Ration at Birth: a bio-cultural analysis
  • R.Mace, F.Jordan
  • 12 'The Cow is the Enemy of Matriliny': using phylogenetic methods to investigate cultural evolution in Africa
  • C.J.Holden, R.Mace
  • 13 Bayesian Estimation of Correlated Evolution across Cultures: a case study of marriage systems and wealth transfer at marriage
  • M.Pagel, A.Meade
  • Bibliography
  • Index.

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