That Complex Whole: Culture And The Evolution Of Human Behavior

Cronk, Lee

ISBN 10: 0813337054 / ISBN 13: 9780813337050

Editore: Routledge, 1999

Riguardo questo articolo

ALL ITEMS ARE DISPATCHED FROM THE UK WITHIN 48 HOURS ( BOOKS ORDERED OVER THE WEEKEND DISPATCHED ON MONDAY) ALL OVERSEAS ORDERS SENT BY TRACKABLE AIR MAIL. IF YOU ARE LOCATED OUTSIDE THE UK PLEASE ASK US FOR A POSTAGE QUOTE FOR MULTI VOLUME SETS BEFORE ORDERING.

Codice articolo mon0000962371

Dati bibliografici

• Titolo: That Complex Whole: Culture And The Evolution Of Human Behavior
• Editore: Routledge
• Data di pubblicazione: 1999
• Lingua: Inglese
• ISBN 10: 0813337054
• ISBN 13: 9780813337050
• Rilegatura: paperback
• Condizione: Very Good

Descrizione articolo

Riassunto

When evolutionary biology stretched out a tentacle called sociobiology and began to probe human behavior back in the 1970s, there was no room for neutrality. Advocates of the new science hailed the dawn of a new era in our understanding of human behavior, while opponents wrung their hands with concern over the new field's potential to transform and even destroy anthropology and other social and behavioral sciences. Twenty years later, little has changed. Anthropology and its sister disciplines are still intact and thriving, though they seldom make use of insights from evolutionary biology. Cultural anthropology in particular has recoiled from the biological threat by moving away from the sciences and toward the humanities. During that same time, a new generation of scholars in biological anthropology, psychology, and other fields has made great progress by using evolutionary theory to understand human behavior, applying it to everything from mating and parenting to the study of mental illness. The success of this research program is threatened, however, by its lack of a serious role for the concept of culture.That Complex Whole: Culture and the Evolution of Human Behavior is an effort to develop a scientific study of human behavior that is at once evolutionary and cultural. In a lively, readable style, it deals with such serious, scholarly issues as how to best define culture, the question of whether culture is present in other species, human universals and human diversity, the relationship between culture and behavior, and cultural and moral relativism. It covers existing models of the relationship between cultural and biological evolution, including the concept of the meme and the new science of memetics, as well as the author's own work on the role of culture in human communications that draws upon the study of animal signals.

Informazioni sull?autore

Lee Cronk teaches anthropology at Texas A&M University. He is coeditor of the forthcoming book, Adaptation and Human Behavior: An Anthropological Perspective.