Cultural evolution : conceptual challenges / Tim Lewens.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Lewens, Tim, author.

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Social evolution.

Physical Description:

1 online resource (x, 205 pages)

Edition:

First edition.

Other Title:

Conceptual challenges

Place of Publication:

Oxford : Oxford University Press, 2015.

Language Note:

English

Summary:

This title exposes and evaluates a set of conceptual disputes concerning what we might mean by culture, and how we should go about accounting for it. Its particular focus is a set of evolutionary approaches to the genesis of the human capacity for culture, to subsequent cultural change, and to the ways in which genetic and cultural change interact, or 'co-evolve'. The book as a whole argues that there is little realistic hope that the social sciences might become unified around an evolutionary synthesis. Instead the defence of evolutionary approaches to culture must be more modest in scope.

Contents:

Introduction

1 What is Cultural Evolutionary Theory?

2 The Kinetic Theory of Culture

3 ‘Culture is Information’

4 Human Nature in Theory

5 Human Nature in Practice

6 The Perils of Cultural Models

7 Populations, People, and Power

8 Cultural Adaptationism

9 Eclectic Evolution

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references and index.

Description based on print version record.

Description based on publisher supplied metadata and other sources.

ISBN:

0-19-107948-0

0-19-181068-1

0-19-165580-5

OCLC:

919431296