![]() ![]() Ĭultural evolution had previously been treated much like biological evolution, but many anthropologists were quick to dismiss this comparison. Sahlins and Service argue that societies develop through a process of specialized adaptions to their habitat and neighbouring societies, and that variations in environments and historical contacts are what leads to cultural diversification. Īnthropologists Marshall Sahlins and Elman Service wrote a book, Evolution and Culture, in which they attempted to synthesize White's and Steward's approaches. ![]() Julian Steward thus linked multilinear evolution with the idea of cultural ecology. Steward rejected the 19th century notion of progress, and instead called attention to the Darwinian notion of "adaptation," arguing that all societies had to adapt to their environment in some way, but that the process could differ between cultures. White thought in broad, universal schemes, while anthropologists such as Julian Steward preferred to use a more limited, multilinear strategy. Leslie White rejected the opposition between "primitive" and "modern" societies but did argue that societies could be distinguished based on the amount of energy they harnessed, and that increased energy allowed for greater social differentiation. Approaches īy mid-twentieth century, anthropologists started to criticize the generalization of culture and the hypothetical stages of cultural evolution, and instead, started a new trend of viewing all cultures as unique according to time and place. This theory focused around the process that culture moves forward down a number of paths consisting of different styles and lengths. History Īround 1940, a number of American anthropologists began rejecting the ideas of unilinear evolutionism and universal evolutionism, and began to move towards the idea of multilinear evolutionism. These conditions provided the context for new theories such as cultural relativism and multilinear evolution, which criticizes the generalization of culture and hypothetical stages of evolution. Modern theories are careful to avoid unsourced, ethnocentric speculation, comparisons, or value judgements more or less regarding individual societies as existing within their own historical contexts. When critique of classical social evolutionism became widely accepted, modern anthropological and sociological approaches have changed to reflect their responses to the critique of their predecessor. This theory has replaced the older 19th century set of theories of unilineal evolution, where evolutionists were deeply interested in making generalizations. It is composed of many competing theories by various sociologists and anthropologists. Multilineal evolution is a 20th-century social theory about the evolution of societies and cultures. JSTOR ( January 2021) ( Learn how and when to remove this template message).Unsourced material may be challenged and removed.įind sources: "Multilineal evolution" – news Please help improve this article by adding citations to reliable sources. ![]() This article needs additional citations for verification. ![]()
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