How Traditions Live and Die
Series: Foundations of Human Interaction;
- Publisher's listprice GBP 135.00
-
60 952 Ft (58 050 Ft + 5% VAT)
The price is estimated because at the time of ordering we do not know what conversion rates will apply to HUF / product currency when the book arrives. In case HUF is weaker, the price increases slightly, in case HUF is stronger, the price goes lower slightly.
- Discount 10% (cc. 6 095 Ft off)
- Discounted price 54 857 Ft (52 245 Ft + 5% VAT)
Subcribe now and take benefit of a favourable price.
Subscribe
60 952 Ft
Availability
printed on demand
Why don't you give exact delivery time?
Delivery time is estimated on our previous experiences. We give estimations only, because we order from outside Hungary, and the delivery time mainly depends on how quickly the publisher supplies the book. Faster or slower deliveries both happen, but we do our best to supply as quickly as possible.
Product details:
- Publisher OUP USA
- Date of Publication 7 January 2016
- ISBN 9780190210496
- Binding Hardback
- No. of pages320 pages
- Size 163x239x25 mm
- Weight 658 g
- Language English 0
Categories
Short description:
This book brings together cognitive science and quantitative cultural history to look into the causes of cultural survival. Instead of blind and faithful imitation, it explores the appeal of traditions evolved to fit cognitive biases. This is both an introduction and an alternative to contemporary theories of cultural evolution.
MoreLong description:
Of all the things we do and say, most will never be repeated or reproduced. Once in a while, however, an idea or a practice generates a chain of transmission that covers more distance through space and time than any individual person ever could. What makes such transmission chains possible? For two centuries, the dominant view (from psychology to anthropology) was that humans owe their cultural prosperity to their powers of imitation. In this view, modern cultures exist because the people who carry them are gifted at remembering, storing and reproducing information. How Traditions Live and Die proposes an alternative to this standard view. What makes traditions live is not a general-purpose imitation capacity. Cultural transmission is partial, selective, often unfaithful. Some traditions live on in spite of this, because they tap into widespread and basic cognitive preferences. These attractive traditions spread, not by being better retained or more accurately transferred, but because they are transmitted over and over. This theory is used to shed light on various puzzles of cultural change (from the distribution of bird songs to the staying power of children's rhymes) and to explain the special relation that links the human species to its cultures. Morin combines recent work in cognitive anthropology with new advances in quantitative cultural history, to map and predict the diffusion of traditions. This book is both an introduction and an accessible alternative to contemporary theories of cultural evolution.
The entire book is written in a very appealing essayistic style, while at the same time facing serious issues with a deep conceptual analysis of the recent literature ... The approach of Morin is certainly a very serious proposal to relate cultural traditions and evolution. Its emphasis of finding the keys in the population of people and ideas, rather than simply in genes, is worthy of attention both of evolutionary psychologists, and for the researchers of many cultural disciplines.
Table of Contents:
Introduction. The Flop Problem and the Wear-and-Tear Problem
1. The Transmission and Diffusion of Traditions
2. Communication and Imitation
3. The Myth of Compulsive Imitation
4. A Theory of Diffusion Chains
5. The Passing of Generations
6. An Ever More Cultural Animal
Index
