How geography shapes cultural diversity (fwd link)

Sat Jun 16 05:25:59 UTC 2012

Well, if you take out all sorts of things like mountains, oceans, and other obstacles to population movement,
the differences between ecological zones generally makes it easier to move laterally than vertically. There
is clear evidence in the English invasion-settlement of North America, settlers tended to move westward
into ecologically compatible zones -- you can't plant cotton in North Dakota, nor grow wheat very successfully
in Alabama. But the Romans moved from lower Italy to northern Britain, the Egyptians consolidated the
length of the Nile, and then went north as far as Syria (but not east or west), the Austronesians (depending
on whose story you accept), may have spread from Taiwan all the way south to Indonesia before turning
eastward, and the Uto-Aztecans spread in one direction as far south as Guatemala and as far north as Utah.
But Algonkians covered the whole breadth of Canada and even into northern California, as well as down
the east coast to Virginia. Simplistic ideas of taking a political boundary (usually a late one) and using that
as a boundary for measuring diversity, are just that -- ignorantly simplistic, no matter how sophisticated the
mathematic mumbo-jumbo is.

    Rudy Troike
    University of Arizona

ILAT at LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU
________________________________
From: Rolland Nadjiwon [mikinakn at SHAW.CA]
Sent: Tuesday, June 12, 2012 2:24 PM
Subject: Re: How geography shapes cultural diversity (fwd link)

So...do you have an opinion on this and if so, I would appreciate reading it....or anyone else...particularly indigenous people on the list....probably worded wrong but not meant to be exclusive or chauvinistic(not a gender statement)...

wahjeh
rolland nadjiwon
_____________________________________
  “in the cabaret of globalization, the state appears as a stripper —
it strips off all its characteristics until only the bare essential remains: repressive force.” SubCommander Marcos...

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From: Indigenous Languages and Technology [mailto:ILAT at LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU] On Behalf Of Phillip E Cash Cash
Sent: June-12-12 1:53 PM
To: ILAT at LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU
Subject: [ILAT] How geography shapes cultural diversity (fwd link)

How geography shapes cultural diversity

Study offers evidence that long countries give better protection to languages than those that are wide.

Zoë Corbyn
11 June 2012

One reason that Eurasian civilizations dominated the globe is because they came from a continent that was broader in an east–west direction than north–south, claimed geographer Jared Diamond in his famous 1997 book Guns, Germs and Steel. Now, a modelling study has found evidence to support this 'continental axis theory'.

Continents that span narrower bands of latitude have less variation in climate, which means a set of plants and animals that are adapted to more similar conditions. That is an advantage, says Diamond, because it means that agricultural innovations are able to diffuse more easily, with culture and ideas following suit. As a result, Diamond's hypothesis predicts, along lines of latitude there will be more cultural homogeneity than along lines of longitude.

To test that prediction, researchers at Stanford University in California used language persistence as a proxy for cultural diversity, and analysed the percentage of historically indigenous languages that remain in use in 147 countries today relative to their shape. For example, the team looked at the difference between Chile, which has a long north–south axis, and Turkey, which has a wider axis running east to west.

Access full article below:
http://www.nature.com/news/how-geography-shapes-cultural-diversity-1.10808

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