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Rethinking the relationship between studies of ethnobiological knowledge and the evolution of human cultural cognition

Ellen, Roy (2017) Rethinking the relationship between studies of ethnobiological knowledge and the evolution of human cultural cognition. In: Power, Camilla and Finnegan, Morna and Callan, Hilary, eds. Human origins: contributions from social anthropology. Methodology and history in Anthropology, 30 . Berghahn, Oxford, New York, pp. 59-83. ISBN 978-1-78533-378-1. E-ISBN 978-1-78533-379-8. (The full text of this publication is not currently available from this repository. You may be able to access a copy if URLs are provided) (KAR id:59989)

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Abstract

Recent projects to reclaim social anthropology for the study of human origins have little to say about cognition of the natural world, while work on the cultural origins of human cognition has paid slight attention to ethnographic data on the organisation of everyday practices. Yet, how early humans organised their knowledge of biota was crucial for certain key adaptations at successive thresholds of evolutionary change. Using comparative work on the perception, engagement and management of biota amongst peoples living in varied environmental and social contexts, and recent theory in psychology, anthropology and ethnobiology, this paper offers a critical review of studies of biological knowledge systems as applied to our understanding of human evolution.

Item Type: Book section
Uncontrolled keywords: Folk biological knowledge, cultural cognition, human evolution, naming, hunter-gatherer ethnography, Palaeolithic archaeology, plant and animal use
Subjects: G Geography. Anthropology. Recreation > GN Anthropology
Divisions: Divisions > Division of Human and Social Sciences > School of Anthropology and Conservation
Depositing User: Roy Ellen
Date Deposited: 22 Jan 2017 11:55 UTC
Last Modified: 08 Mar 2021 11:56 UTC
Resource URI: https://kar.kent.ac.uk/id/eprint/59989 (The current URI for this page, for reference purposes)

University of Kent Author Information

Ellen, Roy.

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