Population structure and cultural geography of a folktale in Europe - PubMed (original) (raw)

Population structure and cultural geography of a folktale in Europe

Robert M Ross et al. Proc Biol Sci. 2013.

Abstract

Despite a burgeoning science of cultural evolution, relatively little work has focused on the population structure of human cultural variation. By contrast, studies in human population genetics use a suite of tools to quantify and analyse spatial and temporal patterns of genetic variation within and between populations. Human genetic diversity can be explained largely as a result of migration and drift giving rise to gradual genetic clines, together with some discontinuities arising from geographical and cultural barriers to gene flow. Here, we adapt theory and methods from population genetics to quantify the influence of geography and ethnolinguistic boundaries on the distribution of 700 variants of a folktale in 31 European ethnolinguistic populations. We find that geographical distance and ethnolinguistic affiliation exert significant independent effects on folktale diversity and that variation between populations supports a clustering concordant with European geography. This pattern of geographical clines and clusters parallels the pattern of human genetic diversity in Europe, although the effects of geographical distance and ethnolinguistic boundaries are stronger for folktales than genes. Our findings highlight the importance of geography and population boundaries in models of human cultural variation and point to key similarities and differences between evolutionary processes operating on human genes and culture.

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Figures

Figure 1.

Figure 1.

Folktale spatial autocorrelation analysis [46]. Spatial correlogram plot showing correlation coefficient (r) as a function of distance for (a) individual-level data from 700 folktales using pairwise Jaccard distances and (b) population-level data from 31 ethnolinguistic groups using pairwise _Φ_ST values. The permuted 95% CI (dashed lines) and the bootstrapped 95% confidence error bars are also shown. Variation in error estimates is influenced by the number of pairwise comparisons within each distance class. (Online version in colour.)

Figure 2.

Figure 2.

NeighbourNet [55] of European folktale populations. The relationship between folktale populations across Europe, based on population folktale _Φ_ST values. Populations that are closer together tend to have more similar folktales. Box-like structures show the reticulate nature of folktale similarity, indicating extensive horizontal transmission (as opposed to vertical transmission down cultural lineages). Shaded polygons show the five clusters discussed in the main text. (Online version in colour.)

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