Cultural Evolution

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Publisher : University of Chicago Press
ISBN 13 : 0226520455
Total Pages : 281 pages
Book Rating : 4.2/5 (265 download)

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Book Synopsis Cultural Evolution by : Alex Mesoudi

Download or read book Cultural Evolution written by Alex Mesoudi and published by University of Chicago Press. This book was released on 2011-07-30 with total page 281 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Charles Darwin changed the course of scientific thinking by showing how evolution accounts for the stunning diversity and biological complexity of life on earth. Recently, there has also been increased interest in the social sciences in how Darwinian theory can explain human culture. Covering a wide range of topics, including fads, public policy, the spread of religion, and herd behavior in markets, Alex Mesoudi shows that human culture is itself an evolutionary process that exhibits the key Darwinian mechanisms of variation, competition, and inheritance. This cross-disciplinary volume focuses on the ways cultural phenomena can be studied scientifically—from theoretical modeling to lab experiments, archaeological fieldwork to ethnographic studies—and shows how apparently disparate methods can complement one another to the mutual benefit of the various social science disciplines. Along the way, the book reveals how new insights arise from looking at culture from an evolutionary angle. Cultural Evolution provides a thought-provoking argument that Darwinian evolutionary theory can both unify different branches of inquiry and enhance understanding of human behavior.

The Evolution of Culture

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Publisher : Routledge
ISBN 13 : 1315418568
Total Pages : 401 pages
Book Rating : 4.3/5 (154 download)

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Book Synopsis The Evolution of Culture by : Leslie A White

Download or read book The Evolution of Culture written by Leslie A White and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2016-06-16 with total page 401 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: One of the major works of twentieth-century anthropological theory, written by one of the discipline’s most important, complex, and controversial figures, has not been in print for several years. Now Evolution of Culture is again available in paperback, allowing today’s generation of anthropologists new access to Leslie White’s crucial contribution to the theory of cultural evolution. A new, substantial introduction by Robert Carneiro and Burton J. Brown assess White’s historical importance and continuing influence in the discipline. White is credited with reintroducing evolution in a way that had a profound impact on our understanding of the relationship between technology, ecology, and culture in the development of civilizations. A materialist, he was particularly concerned with societies’ ability to harness energy as an indicator of progress, and his empirical analysis of this equation covers a vast historical span. Fearlessly tackling the most fundamental questions of culture and society during the cold war, White was frequently a lightning rod both inside and outside the academy. His book will provoke equally potent debates today, and is a key component of any course or reading list in anthropological or archaeological theory and cultural ecology.

Culture and the Evolutionary Process

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Publisher : University of Chicago Press
ISBN 13 : 0226069338
Total Pages : 339 pages
Book Rating : 4.2/5 (26 download)

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Book Synopsis Culture and the Evolutionary Process by : Robert Boyd

Download or read book Culture and the Evolutionary Process written by Robert Boyd and published by University of Chicago Press. This book was released on 1988-06-15 with total page 339 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: How do biological, psychological, sociological, and cultural factors combine to change societies over the long run? Boyd and Richerson explore how genetic and cultural factors interact, under the influence of evolutionary forces, to produce the diversity we see in human cultures. Using methods developed by population biologists, they propose a theory of cultural evolution that is an original and fair-minded alternative to the sociobiology debate.

Evolution and Culture

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Publisher :
ISBN 13 :
Total Pages : 131 pages
Book Rating : 4.:/5 (463 download)

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Book Synopsis Evolution and Culture by : Elman R. Service

Download or read book Evolution and Culture written by Elman R. Service and published by . This book was released on 1973 with total page 131 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:

Evolution, Culture, and the Human Mind

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Publisher : Psychology Press
ISBN 13 : 1136950494
Total Pages : 304 pages
Book Rating : 4.1/5 (369 download)

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Book Synopsis Evolution, Culture, and the Human Mind by : Mark Schaller

Download or read book Evolution, Culture, and the Human Mind written by Mark Schaller and published by Psychology Press. This book was released on 2011-03-17 with total page 304 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: An enormous amount of scientific research compels two fundamental conclusions about the human mind: The mind is the product of evolution; and the mind is shaped by culture. These two perspectives on the human mind are not incompatible, but, until recently, their compatibility has resisted rigorous scholarly inquiry. Evolutionary psychology documents many ways in which genetic adaptations govern the operations of the human mind. But evolutionary inquiries only occasionally grapple seriously with questions about human culture and cross-cultural differences. By contrast, cultural psychology documents many ways in which thought and behavior are shaped by different cultural experiences. But cultural inquires rarely consider evolutionary processes. Even after decades of intensive research, these two perspectives on human psychology have remained largely divorced from each other. But that is now changing - and that is what this book is about. Evolution, Culture, and the Human Mind is the first scholarly book to integrate evolutionary and cultural perspectives on human psychology. The contributors include world-renowned evolutionary, cultural, social, and cognitive psychologists. These chapters reveal many novel insights linking human evolution to both human cognition and human culture – including the evolutionary origins of cross-cultural differences. The result is a stimulating introduction to an emerging integrative perspective on human nature.

The Evolution of Culture in Animals

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Author :
Publisher : Princeton University Press
ISBN 13 : 0691186987
Total Pages : 215 pages
Book Rating : 4.6/5 (911 download)

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Book Synopsis The Evolution of Culture in Animals by : John Tyler Bonner

Download or read book The Evolution of Culture in Animals written by John Tyler Bonner and published by Princeton University Press. This book was released on 2018-06-05 with total page 215 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Animals do have culture, maintains this delightfully illustrated and provocative book, which cites a number of fascinating instances of animal communication and learning. John Bonner traces the origins of culture back to the early biological evolution of animals and provides examples of five categories of behavior leading to nonhuman culture: physical dexterity, relations with other species, auditory communication within a species, geographic locations, and inventions or innovations. Defining culture as the transmission of information by behavioral rather than genetical means, he demonstrates the continuum between the traits we find in animals and those we often consider uniquely human.

Cultural Evolution

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Publisher : Cambridge University Press
ISBN 13 : 1108489311
Total Pages : 293 pages
Book Rating : 4.1/5 (84 download)

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Book Synopsis Cultural Evolution by : Ronald Inglehart

Download or read book Cultural Evolution written by Ronald Inglehart and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2018-03-22 with total page 293 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Presents and tests a theory that helps explain the rise of environmentalist parties, gender equality, and same sex marriage - and the reaction that led to Brexit and the election of Trump.

The Origin and Evolution of Cultures

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Publisher : Evolution and Cognition
ISBN 13 : 019518145X
Total Pages : 465 pages
Book Rating : 4.1/5 (951 download)

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Book Synopsis The Origin and Evolution of Cultures by : Robert Boyd

Download or read book The Origin and Evolution of Cultures written by Robert Boyd and published by Evolution and Cognition. This book was released on 2005 with total page 465 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Origin and Evolution of Cultures presents articles based on two notions. That culture is crucial for understanding human behaviour; and that culture is part of biology. Interest in this collection will span anthropology, psychology, economics, philosophy, and political science.

Cultural Evolution

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Publisher : MIT Press
ISBN 13 : 026255190X
Total Pages : 499 pages
Book Rating : 4.2/5 (625 download)

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Book Synopsis Cultural Evolution by : Peter J. Richerson

Download or read book Cultural Evolution written by Peter J. Richerson and published by MIT Press. This book was released on 2024-04-30 with total page 499 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Leading scholars report on current research that demonstrates the central role of cultural evolution in explaining human behavior. Over the past few decades, a growing body of research has emerged from a variety of disciplines to highlight the importance of cultural evolution in understanding human behavior. Wider application of these insights, however, has been hampered by traditional disciplinary boundaries. To remedy this, in this volume leading researchers from theoretical biology, developmental and cognitive psychology, linguistics, anthropology, sociology, religious studies, history, and economics come together to explore the central role of cultural evolution in different aspects of human endeavor. The contributors take as their guiding principle the idea that cultural evolution can provide an important integrating function across the various disciplines of the human sciences, as organic evolution does for biology. The benefits of adopting a cultural evolutionary perspective are demonstrated by contributions on social systems, technology, language, and religion. Topics covered include enforcement of norms in human groups, the neuroscience of technology, language diversity, and prosociality and religion. The contributors evaluate current research on cultural evolution and consider its broader theoretical and practical implications, synthesizing past and ongoing work and sketching a roadmap for future cross-disciplinary efforts. Contributors Quentin D. Atkinson, Andrea Baronchelli, Robert Boyd, Briggs Buchanan, Joseph Bulbulia, Morten H. Christiansen, Emma Cohen, William Croft, Michael Cysouw, Dan Dediu, Nicholas Evans, Emma Flynn, Pieter François, Simon Garrod, Armin W. Geertz, Herbert Gintis, Russell D. Gray, Simon J. Greenhill, Daniel B. M. Haun, Joseph Henrich, Daniel J. Hruschka, Marco A. Janssen, Fiona M. Jordan, Anne Kandler, James A. Kitts, Kevin N. Laland, Laurent Lehmann, Stephen C. Levinson, Elena Lieven, Sarah Mathew, Robert N. McCauley, Alex Mesoudi, Ara Norenzayan, Harriet Over, Jürgen Renn, Victoria Reyes-García, Peter J. Richerson, Stephen Shennan, Edward G. Slingerland, Dietrich Stout, Claudio Tennie, Peter Turchin, Carel van Schaik, Matthijs Van Veelen, Harvey Whitehouse, Thomas Widlok, Polly Wiessner, David Sloan Wilson

Pattern and Process in Cultural Evolution

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Publisher : Univ of California Press
ISBN 13 : 9780520255999
Total Pages : 384 pages
Book Rating : 4.2/5 (559 download)

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Book Synopsis Pattern and Process in Cultural Evolution by : Stephen Shennan

Download or read book Pattern and Process in Cultural Evolution written by Stephen Shennan and published by Univ of California Press. This book was released on 2009 with total page 384 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This volume offers an integrative approach to the application of evolutionary theory in studies of cultural transmission and social evolution and reveals the enormous range of ways in which Darwinian ideas can lead to productive empirical research, the touchstone of any worthwhile theoretical perspective. While many recent works on cultural evolution adopt a specific theoretical framework, such as dual inheritance theory or human behavioral ecology, Pattern and Process in Cultural Evolution emphasizes empirical analysis and includes authors who employ a range of backgrounds and methods to address aspects of culture from an evolutionary perspective. Editor Stephen Shennan has assembled archaeologists, evolutionary theorists, and ethnographers, whose essays cover a broad range of time periods, localities, cultural groups, and artifacts.

People and Cultures of Hawaii

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Publisher : University of Hawaii Press
ISBN 13 : 0824860268
Total Pages : 378 pages
Book Rating : 4.8/5 (248 download)

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Book Synopsis People and Cultures of Hawaii by : Thomas W. Maretzki

Download or read book People and Cultures of Hawaii written by Thomas W. Maretzki and published by University of Hawaii Press. This book was released on 2011-04-30 with total page 378 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This is a significant update to the highly influential text People and Cultures of Hawaii: A Psychocultural Profile. Since its publication in 1980, the immigrant groups it discusses in depth have matured and new ones have been added to the mix. The present work tracks the course of these changes over the past twenty years, constructing a historical understanding of each group as it evolved from race to ethnicity to culture. Individual chapters begin with an overview of one of fifteen groups. Following the development of its unique ethnocultural identity, distinctive character traits such as temperament and emotional expression are explored—as well as ethnic stereotypes. Also discussed are modifications to the group’s ethnocultural identity over time and generational change—which traits may have changed over generations and which are more hardwired or enduring. An important feature of each chapter is the focus on the group’s family social structure, generational and gender roles, power distribution, and central values and life goals. Readers will also find a description of the group’s own internal social class structure, social and political strategies, and occupational and educational patterns. Finally, contributors consider how a particular ethnic group has blended into Hawai‘i’s culturally sensitive society. People and Cultures of Hawai‘i: The Evolution of Culture and Ethnicity will, like its predecessor, fill an important niche in understanding the history of different ethnic groups in Hawai‘i.

The Secret of Our Success

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Publisher : Princeton University Press
ISBN 13 : 0691178437
Total Pages : 464 pages
Book Rating : 4.6/5 (911 download)

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Book Synopsis The Secret of Our Success by : Joseph Henrich

Download or read book The Secret of Our Success written by Joseph Henrich and published by Princeton University Press. This book was released on 2017-10-17 with total page 464 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: How our collective intelligence has helped us to evolve and prosper Humans are a puzzling species. On the one hand, we struggle to survive on our own in the wild, often failing to overcome even basic challenges, like obtaining food, building shelters, or avoiding predators. On the other hand, human groups have produced ingenious technologies, sophisticated languages, and complex institutions that have permitted us to successfully expand into a vast range of diverse environments. What has enabled us to dominate the globe, more than any other species, while remaining virtually helpless as lone individuals? This book shows that the secret of our success lies not in our innate intelligence, but in our collective brains—on the ability of human groups to socially interconnect and learn from one another over generations. Drawing insights from lost European explorers, clever chimpanzees, mobile hunter-gatherers, neuroscientific findings, ancient bones, and the human genome, Joseph Henrich demonstrates how our collective brains have propelled our species' genetic evolution and shaped our biology. Our early capacities for learning from others produced many cultural innovations, such as fire, cooking, water containers, plant knowledge, and projectile weapons, which in turn drove the expansion of our brains and altered our physiology, anatomy, and psychology in crucial ways. Later on, some collective brains generated and recombined powerful concepts, such as the lever, wheel, screw, and writing, while also creating the institutions that continue to alter our motivations and perceptions. Henrich shows how our genetics and biology are inextricably interwoven with cultural evolution, and how culture-gene interactions launched our species on an extraordinary evolutionary trajectory. Tracking clues from our ancient past to the present, The Secret of Our Success explores how the evolution of both our cultural and social natures produce a collective intelligence that explains both our species' immense success and the origins of human uniqueness.

Culture History and Convergent Evolution

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Publisher : Springer Nature
ISBN 13 : 3030461262
Total Pages : 302 pages
Book Rating : 4.0/5 (34 download)

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Book Synopsis Culture History and Convergent Evolution by : Huw S. Groucutt

Download or read book Culture History and Convergent Evolution written by Huw S. Groucutt and published by Springer Nature. This book was released on 2020-07-23 with total page 302 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This volume brings together diverse contributions from leading archaeologists and paleoanthropologists, covering various spatial and temporal periods to distinguish convergent evolution from cultural transmission in order to see if we can discover ancient human populations. With a focus on lithic technology, the book analyzes ancient materials and cultures to systematically explore the theoretical and physical aspects of culture, convergence, and populations in human evolution and prehistory. The book will be of interest to academics, students and researchers in archaeology, paleoanthropology, genetics, and paleontology. The book begins by addressing early prehistory, discussing the convergent evolution of behaviors and the diverse ecological conditions driving the success of different evolutionary paths. Chapters discuss these topics and technology in the context of the Lower Paleolithic/Earlier Stone age and Middle Paleolithic/Middle Stone Age. The book then moves towards a focus on the prehistory of our species over the last 40,000 years. Topics covered include the human evolutionary and dispersal consequences of the Middle-Upper Paleolithic Transition in Western Eurasia. Readers will also learn about the cultural convergences, and divergences, that occurred during the Terminal Pleistocene and Holocene, such as the budding of human societies in the Americas. The book concludes by integrating these various perspectives and theories, and explores different methods of analysis to link technological developments and cultural convergence.

Not By Genes Alone

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Publisher : University of Chicago Press
ISBN 13 : 0226712133
Total Pages : 343 pages
Book Rating : 4.2/5 (267 download)

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Book Synopsis Not By Genes Alone by : Peter J. Richerson

Download or read book Not By Genes Alone written by Peter J. Richerson and published by University of Chicago Press. This book was released on 2008-06-20 with total page 343 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Humans are a striking anomaly in the natural world. While we are similar to other mammals in many ways, our behavior sets us apart. Our unparalleled ability to adapt has allowed us to occupy virtually every habitat on earth using an incredible variety of tools and subsistence techniques. Our societies are larger, more complex, and more cooperative than any other mammal's. In this stunning exploration of human adaptation, Peter J. Richerson and Robert Boyd argue that only a Darwinian theory of cultural evolution can explain these unique characteristics. Not by Genes Alone offers a radical interpretation of human evolution, arguing that our ecological dominance and our singular social systems stem from a psychology uniquely adapted to create complex culture. Richerson and Boyd illustrate here that culture is neither superorganic nor the handmaiden of the genes. Rather, it is essential to human adaptation, as much a part of human biology as bipedal locomotion. Drawing on work in the fields of anthropology, political science, sociology, and economics—and building their case with such fascinating examples as kayaks, corporations, clever knots, and yams that require twelve men to carry them—Richerson and Boyd convincingly demonstrate that culture and biology are inextricably linked, and they show us how to think about their interaction in a way that yields a richer understanding of human nature. In abandoning the nature-versus-nurture debate as fundamentally misconceived, Not by Genes Alone is a truly original and groundbreaking theory of the role of culture in evolution and a book to be reckoned with for generations to come. “I continue to be surprised by the number of educated people (many of them biologists) who think that offering explanations for human behavior in terms of culture somehow disproves the suggestion that human behavior can be explained in Darwinian evolutionary terms. Fortunately, we now have a book to which they may be directed for enlightenment . . . . It is a book full of good sense and the kinds of intellectual rigor and clarity of writing that we have come to expect from the Boyd/Richerson stable.”—Robin Dunbar, Nature “Not by Genes Alone is a valuable and very readable synthesis of a still embryonic but very important subject straddling the sciences and humanities.”—E. O. Wilson, Harvard University

Race, Culture, and Evolution

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Publisher : University of Chicago Press
ISBN 13 : 0226774945
Total Pages : 409 pages
Book Rating : 4.2/5 (267 download)

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Book Synopsis Race, Culture, and Evolution by : George W. Stocking

Download or read book Race, Culture, and Evolution written by George W. Stocking and published by University of Chicago Press. This book was released on 1982-04-15 with total page 409 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "We have, at long last, a real historian with real historical skills and no intra-professional ax to grind. . . . All these pieces show the virtues one finds missing in . . . nearly all of anthropological history work but [Stocking's]: extensive and critical use of archival sources, tracing of real rather than merely plausible intellectual connections, and contextualization of ideas and movements in terms of broader social and cultural currents. Stocking writes very clearly; attacks important topics—race and evolution, the influence of scientism, the interaction between anthropology and other disciplines; and is methodologically very sophisticated. Though his main theme is the development of racialism and of opposition to it, his book bears on a range of issues very much alive in anthropology. . . . I would think no apprentice anthropologist ought to be pronounced a journeyman until he or she has absorbed what Stocking has to say."—Clifford Geertz, The Institute for Advanced Study, Princeton

Human Evolution Beyond Biology and Culture

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Publisher : Cambridge University Press
ISBN 13 : 1108470971
Total Pages : 575 pages
Book Rating : 4.1/5 (84 download)

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Book Synopsis Human Evolution Beyond Biology and Culture by : Jeroen C. J. M. van den Bergh

Download or read book Human Evolution Beyond Biology and Culture written by Jeroen C. J. M. van den Bergh and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2018-10-18 with total page 575 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A complete account of evolutionary thought in the social, environmental and policy sciences, creating bridges with biology.

Origins of the Modern Mind

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Publisher : Harvard University Press
ISBN 13 : 0674253701
Total Pages : 428 pages
Book Rating : 4.6/5 (742 download)

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Book Synopsis Origins of the Modern Mind by : Merlin Donald

Download or read book Origins of the Modern Mind written by Merlin Donald and published by Harvard University Press. This book was released on 1993-03-15 with total page 428 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This bold and brilliant book asks the ultimate question of the life sciences: How did the human mind acquire its incomparable power? In seeking the answer, Merlin Donald traces the evolution of human culture and cognition from primitive apes to artificial intelligence, presenting an enterprising and original theory of how the human mind evolved from its presymbolic form.