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Sociocultural evolution, sociocultural evolutionism or cultural evolution are theories of cultural and social evolution that describe how cultures and societies change over time. Whereas sociocultural development traces processes that tend to increase the complexity of a society or culture, sociocultural evolution also considers process that can lead to decreases in complexity (degeneration) or that can produce variation or proliferation without any seemingly significant changes in complexity (cladogenesis).〔 Sociocultural evolution is "the process by which structural reorganization is affected through time, eventually producing a form or structure which is qualitatively different from the ancestral form". ''(Note, this article focusses on that use of the term 'socio-cultural evolution' to refer to work that is not in line with contemporary understandings of the word 'evolution'. There is a separate body of academic work which uses the term 'cultural evolution' using a more consensus Darwinian understanding of the term 'evolution'. For a description of this work, based in the foundational work of DT Campbell in the 1960s and followed up by Boyd, Richerson, Cvalli-Sforza, and Feldman in the 1980s, go to Cultural evolution or Dual inheritance theory.)'' Most 19th-century and some 20th-century approaches to socioculture aimed to provide models for the evolution of humankind as a whole, arguing that different societies have reached different stages of social development. The most comprehensive attempt to develop a general theory of social evolution centering on the development of socio-cultural systems, the work of Talcott Parsons (1902-1979), operated on a scale which included a theory of world history. Another attempt, on a less systematic scale, originated with the world-systems approach. More recent approaches focus on changes specific to individual societies and reject the idea that cultures differ primarily according to how far each one is on the linear scale of social progress. Most modern archaeologists and cultural anthropologists work within the frameworks of neoevolutionism, sociobiology and modernization theory. Many different societies have existed in the course of human history, with estimates as high as over one million separate societies; however, , only about two hundred or so different societies survive.〔 〕 == Introduction == Anthropologists and sociologists often assume that human beings have natural social tendencies and that particular human social behaviours have non-genetic causes and dynamics (i.e. they are learned in a social environment and through social interaction). Societies exist in complex social environments (i.e. with natural resources and constraints) and adapt themselves to these environments. It is thus inevitable that all societies change. Specific theories of social or cultural evolution often attempt to explain differences between coeval societies, by positing that different societies have reached different stages of development. Although such theories typically provide models for understanding the relationship between technologies, social structure or the values of a society, they vary as to the extent to which they describe specific mechanisms of variation and change. Early sociocultural evolution theoriesthe theories of Auguste Comte, Herbert Spencer and Lewis Henry Morgandeveloped simultaneously with, but independently of, Charles Darwin's works and were popular from the late 19th century to the end of World War I. These 19th-century unilineal evolution theories claimed that societies start out in a ''primitive'' state and gradually become more ''civilized'' over time, and equated the culture and technology of Western civilization with progress. Some forms of early sociocultural evolution theories (mainly unilineal ones) have led to much criticised theories like social Darwinism and scientific racism, used in the past to justify existing policies of colonialism and slavery and to justify new policies such as eugenics. Most 19th-century and some 20th-century approaches aimed to provide models for the evolution of humankind as a single entity. However, most 20th-century approaches, such as multilineal evolution, focused on changes specific to individual societies. Moreover, they rejected directional change (i.e. orthogenetic, teleological or progressive change). Most archaeologists work within the framework of multilineal evolution. Other contemporary approaches to social change include neoevolutionism, sociobiology, dual inheritance theory, modernisation theory and postindustrial theory. In his seminal 1976 book ''The Selfish Gene'', Richard Dawkins wrote that "there are some examples of cultural evolution in birds and monkeys, but ... it is our own species that really shows what cultural evolution can do".〔Richard Dawkins, ''The Selfish Gene'', p. 190. (edition? )〕 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Sociocultural evolution」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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