FROM CULTURAL REVOLUTION TO CULTURAL EVOLUTION

Stochasticity in cultural evolution: a revolution yet to happen

Over the last 40 years or so, there has been an explosion of cultural evolution research in anthropology and archaeology. In each discipline, cultural evolutionists investigate how interactions between individuals translate into group level patterns, with the aim of explaining the diachronic dynamics and diversity of cultural traits. However, while much attention has been given to deterministic...

Teaching the Cultural Revolution

How can we as educators address complex and controversial topics in the social sciences without encouraging simplistic responses and self-reproducing binary oppositions? Drawing upon an ethnographic analysis of a fi rst-year writing seminar on the history of the Chinese Cultural Revolution, this article proposes novel approaches to overcome instinctive reactions to contentious topics. Arguing t...

Cultural commons and cultural evolution

Culture evolves following a process that is akin to biological evolution, although with some significant differences. At the same time culture has often a collective good value for human groups. This paper studies culture in an evolutionary perspective, with a focus on the implications of group definition for the coexistence of different cultures. A model of cultural evolution is presented wher...

The Chinese Cultural Revolution Revisited

This paper intends to construct a framework of understanding the Cultural Revolution and the complexities of such an event on the basis of historically novel forms of political, social and ideological relations. It brings the Cultural Revolution back in a good light so as to show its immense, autonomous historical importance as well as its continuing relevance. It studies and establishes the re...

Cultural Evolution