Cultural and Linguistic Diversity: Evolutionary Approaches (Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society series B)

Evolutionary approaches to cultural change are increasingly influential, and many scientists believe that a ‘grand synthesis’ is now in sight. The papers in this Theme Issue, which derives from a symposium held by the AHRC Centre for the Evolution of Cultural Diversity (University College London) in December 2008, focus on how the phylogenetic tree-building and network-based techniques used to estimate descent relationships in biology can be adapted to reconstruct cultural histories, where some degree of inter-societal diffusion will almost inevitably be superimposed on any deeper signal of a historical branching process. The disciplines represented include the three most purely ‘cultural’ fields from the four-field model of anthropology (cultural anthropology, archaeology and linguistic anthropology). In this short introduction, some context is provided from the history of anthropology, and key issues raised by the papers are highlighted. Contents......Page 3 Introduction: cultural transmission and evolution......Page 5 Units and models of cultural transmission......Page 6 Cultural macroevolution as an inverse problem......Page 7 REFERENCES......Page 8 Introduction......Page 10 Interdemic group selection can be important when there are multiple stable equilibria......Page 11 Conformist social learning......Page 12 Interdemic group selection is probably more important in cultural than genetic evolution......Page 13 Variation in extinction rates......Page 14 Imitation of successful neighbours......Page 15 Gene-culture coevolution......Page 16 REFERENCES......Page 17 Introduction......Page 19 Kinds of units......Page 20 Hierarchies of units......Page 21 Recipes as units......Page 22 Discussion......Page 25 REFERENCES......Page 26 Introduction......Page 29 The basic framework......Page 30 Initializing and running the model along discrete time steps......Page 31 Results......Page 32 Application and further considerations......Page 33 Two measures of homology......Page 34 Applying the simulation model to study the consistency index and retention index......Page 35 Results......Page 36 Applying the results to real-world data......Page 38 REFERENCES......Page 39 The wave theory......Page 42 AGGREGATE (DIALECTOMETRIC) VARIATION......Page 43 A DIALECTOMETRIC VIEW OF GRAVITY......Page 44 Séguy's law......Page 45 Simulating diffusion......Page 47 CONCLUSIONS AND FUTURE WORK......Page 48 References......Page 49 Language divergence and the real world: two models, one reality......Page 50 Network......Page 52 NeighborNet......Page 54 Measuring network versus tree signals......Page 55 Data formats: multi-state, binary or distance measures?......Page 56 State versus distance data: theory and practice......Page 58 Limitations of NeighborNet......Page 60 Why distance data work in practice: a new proposal......Page 61 Lessons for Indo-European, and for historical linguistic methodology?......Page 63 REFERENCES......Page 64 Background to the languages of Australia......Page 65 Pama-Nyungan languages and subgrouping......Page 66 Relationships between Pama-Nyungan and other Australian languages......Page 67 Prior classification......Page 68 Results and discussion......Page 69 REFERENCES......Page 72 Introduction......Page 75 Diglossia model......Page 78 Results......Page 79 Discussion......Page 80 Basic model......Page 81 Diglossia model......Page 82 REFERENCES......Page 83 Introduction......Page 85 Co-divergence......Page 86 Horizontal transfer......Page 87 Case study: the spread of weaving in iranian tribal groups......Page 88 REFERENCES......Page 92 Introduction......Page 95 Complex hunter-gatherers of the pacific northwest coast......Page 96 Materials: northwest coast housing traits......Page 97 Tree-based methods......Page 99 Network-based methods......Page 101 Branching versus blending?......Page 102 Discussion: long-houses, language and social institutions......Page 105 REFERENCES......Page 106 Introduction......Page 109 Phenetic distance networks, cladograms and neighbornets......Page 110 Previous research on the cultural relatedness of Lapita colonists......Page 111 Methodological concerns in phylogenetic analyses of Lapita motifs in Remote Oceania......Page 112 Results......Page 116 Conclusion......Page 118 REFERENCES......Page 120 Introduction......Page 123 Extinction probability......Page 125 Analysis......Page 126 Discussion......Page 127 The authors would like to thank Monique Borgerhoff Mulder and Charles Nunn for making the simulation code available. We would also like to thank Charles Nunn and two anonymous reviewers for helpful comments on earlier versions of this manuscript. T.E.C. was funded by NERC/ESRC Interdisciplinary Research Studentship and a JSPS Post-doctoral Fellowship. S.J.G. was supported by the Royal Society of New Zealand Marsden Fund.......Page 131 REFERENCES......Page 132 Introduction......Page 133 Tree samples......Page 134 Estimation of ancestral states......Page 135 Austronesian......Page 136 Rates of change......Page 137 Discussion......Page 139 REFERENCES......Page 140 Introduction......Page 143 The shape of cultural evolution......Page 144 The fabric of cultural evolution......Page 148 Conclusion......Page 151 REFERENCES......Page 152