Julian H. Steward (1902-1972)
Julian Steward (1902-1972), a Boasian by intellectual upbringing, is the “father” of modern cultural ecology. Steward influenced a host of distinguished political and economic anthropologists, including Morton Fried, Andrew Vayda, Eric Wolf, and Elman Service. Steward’s studies grew out of the concept used by Boasians Alfred Louis Kroeber and Clark Wissler, “culture area,” used to to demarcate American Native groups. Steward’s first research was in archeology, then he moved on to ethnography and worked with the Shoshoni, the Pueblo, and later the Carrier Indians in British Columbia. Steward also devoted a great deal of energy to the study of parallel developmental sequences in the evolution of civilizations in the New and Old Worlds. He termed the cultural features associated with subsistence practices the “cultural core.” Steward viewed his specialist brand of cultural evolutionism as “multilineal.”
Contribution to the study of cultural evolution
Julian Steward’s contribution to the study of cultural evolution is unique, for it was he, who for the first time gave a broad typology of evolution on the basis of his methodological study of different cultural areas of the world.
Steward said that cultural evolution may be defined broadly as a quest for cultural regularities or laws and further in his book Theory of Culture Change pointed out that there are three distinctive ways in which evolutionary data may be handled,
- Firstly, the Unilinear Evolution: The classicial evolutionists of the nineteenth-century developed a formulation, which dealt with particular cultures and placed them in stages of a universal sequence.
- Secondly, the Universal Evolution: An arbitrary label to designate the modern revamping of unilinear evolution, where universal evolutionists are concerned with Culture of human kind rather than with cultures.
- Thirdly, Multilinear Evolution: Those who believed in multiple developmental sequences, a some what less ambitious approach than the other two.
Julian Steward elaborated his theory of neo-evolution in his famous book “Theory of Culture Change”. published in 1955 from the University of Illinois.
Unilinear Evolution
According to Steward, those evolutionists, who talked about the cultural evolution in terms of three stages viz. savagery, barbarism and civilization, may be designated as unilinear evolutionists. Among these unilinear evolutionists, special mention may be made of Tylor, Morgan etc., who were really the champions of this scheme of cultural evolution. Steward further argues that, although no effort has been made to revive these schemes in the light of new empirical ethnographic and archaeological data concerning the history of individual culture which itself is a somewhat remarkable fact. It does not necessarily follow that the unilinear evolutionists failed completely to recognize significant patterns and processes of change in particular cases. However, the inadequacy of unilinear evolution lies largely in the postulated priority of matriarchal patterns, over the other kinship patterns and in the indiscriminate effort to force the data pre-civilized groups of mankind into the categories of “savagery” and “barbarism”. The category of “civilization”, however, involved a less sweeping generalization for the simple reason that civilization was thought of largely in terms of the Near-East, the Northern Mediterranean and Northern Europe..
While summing up the unilinear evolutionsim, Steward pointed out that there are probably many developmental forms and processes discussed by the evolutionists, which have validity, provided that they are considered qualities of particular cultural traditions rather than universal characteristics of culture.
Universal Evolution
Julian Steward has pointed out that universal evolution is presently represented by V. Gordon Childe and Leslie White. He argues that universal evolution is the heritage of the nineteenth century unilineal evolution. White and Childe, according to Steward, endeavour to keep the evolutionary concept of cultural stages alive by relating these stages to the culture of mankind as a whole. The distinctive cultural traditions and the local variations of the culture areas and sub-areas which have developed as the result of special historical trends and of cultural ecological adaptations to special environments are excluded as irrelevant. However, it is important to note that the evolutionism of White and Childe yields substantive results of a very different order from those of the nineteenth century evolutionists. Again, Steward comments that the postulated cultural sequences, provided by the universal evolutionists, are so general that they are neither very arguable nor very useful.
Multlinear Evolution
Julian Steward says “multlinear evolution is essentially a methodology based on the assumption that significant regularities in cultural change occur, and it is concerned with the determination of cultural laws” . He further says that “its methods are empirical rather than deductive” .He personally believes in multilinear evolution.
Steward was of opinion that although multilinear evolution is concerned with the historical reconstruction, it does not reveal that the historical data should be classified in universal stages. The multilinear evolutionists are interested in particular cultures, but instead of finding local variations and diversity, which force the frame of reference from the particular to general, it deals only with those limited parallels of form, function and sequence, which have empirical validity. Steward says that “what is lost in universality will be gained in concreteness and specificity”
Method of Multilinear Evolution (Cultural Ecology)
Julian Steward points out that “parallelism” and “casuality” are always present in cultural studies and, thus, the methodology of cultural studies remains predominantly that of historical particularizing rather than of scientific generalizing. American anthropologists have traditionally assumed that there old world and new world parallels in the invention of farming, stock-breeding, ceramics, metallurgy, states, priests, temples, the zero and mathematics, writings and other features. When the question of parallel cultural casuality arises, these similarities are held to be only superficial or to represent convergent evolution or else it is said that the historical and functional relationships involved are as yet too imperfectly understood to permit formulation in terms of cross-cultural regularities.
The determination and analysis of parallels as a methodological objective of multilinear evolution need not be carried out on a purely cultural level. Steward has endeavoured in various studies (1938) to demonstrate how cultural ecological adaptations the adaptive processes through which Historically derived cuIture is modified in a particular environment are among the important creative processes in culture change. The kinds of parallels or similarities with which multilinear evolution deals are distinguished by their limited occurrence and their specificity. For this reason, as Steward argues, the oustanding methodological problem of multilinear evolution is an appropriate texonomy of cultural phenomena.
Theory of Culture Changes (1955) looks at Julian Steward’s theoretical analysis of the relationship between environment and culture. Steward hypothesizes that resource exploitation gives rise to the social systems that exist in a specific location. The resource exploitation of a society is determined by the technological adaptations that people make to their surrounding environment. Steward’s book also looks at the concept of multilinear evolution, which states different societies progress at different paces, with the pace of development depending on the natural resources that surround a society. The author also goes on to critique fellow anthropologists in his book. He feels that the majority of his contemporary anthropologists overlook the impact of environment on a society. Thus, he coined the term, envisioning cultural ecology as a methodology for understanding how humans adapt to such a wide variety of environments.
In the Theory of Culture Change: The Methodology of Multilinear Evolution (1955), Julian Steward modified the concept of culture to divide culture into two parts, a culture comprising of the techno-economic systems that directly interact with the environment and a peripheral culture that grows by historical and specific conditions of existence of the culture. The relationship between the culture core and the environment is both functional and dialectical and establishes the methodology of cultural ecology. Cultural ecology recognizes that ecologies of locale plays a significant role in shaping the cultures of a region.
The specific relationships of core and environment are conditioned by the nature of the environment and while they establish the direction of evolution of cultures, they are not universal but follow a multilinear pattern in which each environmental zone could be expected to have its own mode of evolution and one could generalize across similar environmental zones.
The peripheral culture on the other hand gives to each culture its unique character. Thus while the culture core of all societies having say, a hunting food gathering way of life, will be expectedly similar, their peripheral culture like language, art etc. can be different.
Steward looks at the North American Eskimos to validate the intimate relationship between a people and their environment. The Eskimos, he argues, live in small family groups rather than a large community because they live in a harsh environment that offers very few natural resources, such as food. Technology such as the bow, spears, and traps are readily available to the Eskimos, but their effectiveness is severely limited by the environment. A similar situation is also found in the Nevada-based Shoshoni Native Americans. The lack of an abundant food source resulted in the fragmentation of the tribe into smaller family groups.
In anther case Irrigation Civilizations (1955) illustrates how the collective labour and centralized authority required for irrigation in an arid climate resulted in increased social stratification and, ultimately, in the development of the state in various areas of the world such as China, Mesopotamia, Peru, and Mesoamerica
Julian Steward’s three fundamental procedures of cultural ecology method
- Document the technologies and methods used to exploit the environment to get a living from it.
- Look at patterns of human behavior/culture associated with using the environment. i.e this looks at the interaction between people based on the environment. The abundance or scarcity of resources determines whether people will make a collective effort or work independently.
- Assess how much these patterns of behavior influenced other aspects of culture (e.g., how, in a drought-prone region, great concern over rainfall patterns meant this became central to everyday life, and led to the development of a religious belief system in which rainfall and water figured very strongly. This belief system may not appear in a society where good rainfall for crops can be taken for granted, or where irrigation was practiced).
Julian Steward’s book Theory of Culture Change is a holistic and comparative look at the field of cultural ecology. Written in 1955, it is still a relevant source on the subject. Julian Steward was a pioneer in the field of cultural ecology and his theories on the subject are chronicled in his Theory of Culture Changes (1955) book.
Main Points
- The Cultural Ecology theory considers how environmental forces influence humans and how human activities affect the biosphere and the Earth itself. The study of the environment’s effects on humans was especially prevalent in the 1950s-1970s when Julian Steward founded the anthropological theory of Cultural Ecology. Steward defined Cultural Ecology in his 1955 book, The Theory of Cultural Change, as “a heuristic device for understanding the effect of environment upon culture.”
- Cultural Ecology focuses on how cultural beliefs and practices helps human populations adapt to their environments and live within the means of their ecosystem. It contributes to social organization and other human institutions. Cultural Ecology also interprets cultural practices in terms of their long-term role in helping humans adapt to their environment. For example, about 10 million Yaks live on the Tibetan plateau and are therefore commonly used in Tibetan culture for transportation and subsistence needs.
- The Cultural Ecology theory can be used to analyze the distribution of wealth and power in a society, and how that affects behaviors of exchange. For example, the potlatch tradition of the Pacific Coast native cultures encourages people to redistribute their belongings within the community. This tradition increases prestige and social bonds while meeting the community’s subsistence needs.
- Cultural Ecology views culture as evolutionary—the cultural adaptations have come as the result of a changing environment. However, Steward looks at the evolution as multi-linear, as opposed to the early anthropological theories that saw societies as uni-linear and working towards one main goal: civilization. It recognizes that each environment requires different adaptations and that not every culture is working towards the same “norm”.
- Also, on the conceptual as well as methodological level, cultural ecology has steadily made an effort to combine both the ideas and the approaches of the natural and social sciences. In this way, cultural ecology seeks to explain the social sciences by the means of the natural sciences. It uses the environmental pressures as explanations for cultural change. It therefore recognizes the ways in which different societies adapt differently not as a result of intelligence, but as a result of their climate.
Critiques
Over Emphasis on Environment
Although Ecological Anthropology is an important theory in anthropology, it doesn’t go with out critique. One critique is that too much emphasis is placed on environment while other influences on a culture are ignored. Although ones environment heavily impacts their culture, the political systems of which they are a part of further alter their culture and environment. Common threats to peoples and their environments are development, cultivation, industrial pollution and imposition of external management systems.
The way in which cultures adapt to their environments can be restricted and heavily altered by political systems. For example, Marvin Harris’s study on the significance of cows with in Indian culture, does not place enough emphasis on the fact that cows have become legally protected and how harming a cow could result in major punishment. He focuses on the cows uses and potential uses with in the culture, while ignoring the fact that it is a cultural aspect that is supported, protected and upheld by political powers. Another example where cultural ecology overlooks political influences is seen in the Tohono O’odham tribe, native to the southwestern Arizona and Mexican area and lost important aspects of culture due to international politics. In 1853 Gadsden purchase where the O’odham’s territory was split between the United States and Mexico, restricting accessibility to food and other materials with in their own community. Splitting the tribe completely altered their entire culture, religion and practices. Cultural ecology places too much emphasis on the environment, overlooking political influences that may impact similar environments in very different ways.
Unfocused Direction
An additional critique of Cultural Ecology is that it is too broad of a discipline. Robert McNetting, author of Cultural Ecology, states “Cultural Ecology is a convenient title rather than an invitation to scholarly debate”. McNetting conveys that cultural ecology is simply too broad of a discipline, which makes it difficult to debate its validity. The idea that Cultural Ecology is somewhat vague and ambiguous is exemplified by a table created by Catherine Marquette of the University of Indiana. Marquette demonstrates that the definition of how culture is shaped by ecology varies from anthropologist to anthropologist, suggesting that the discipline of Cultural Ecology is unfocused.
Testing the Validity
One of the main components of Cultural Ecology is the idea of environmental determinism, or that culture is created by the surrounding ecology. If the environment is the sole determining factor in culture, one would expect cultures of very similar clines to exhibit very similar cultures. This idea was applied in Western Africa and anthropologists found that there were many examples of people who lived in the same cline and geographic area, with access to the same resources, and demonstrated varying cultures. Their differences were so extreme that the even had alternative modes of food production. After continuing their investigation anthropologists found that cultures further away, in different climates, and exhibiting the same modality of food production contained more similarities in culture than the geographically close and similar environment study group. This suggests that modality of food production may have a greater influence on the similarities of cultures than their geographic and environmental location.
Possibilities for the Future
Professor Roy Rappaport of the University of Michigan stated “Culture imposes on nature as nature imposes on culture”. Within this statement he challenges the idea that the environment solely influences culture (environmental determinism). Continuing with Rappaport’s destruction of culture solely influencing the environment, perhaps there are more elements that influence culture.
The idea of environmental possibilism is most likely the best trajectory for Cultural Ecology Anthropologists to follow. Contrasted to environmental determinism, environmental possibilism states that the environment allows for various possibilities of cultures to occur and prohibits others. The Inuit of North America are not going to develop an agricultural food system in the Arctic, but they could respond to their environment in any number of ways, exhibited by other tribes like the Aleut, Alutiq and Yupik. The environment shapes what is possible, but it does not constitute the only factor. Other variables like cultural diffusion, history and modality of food production cannot be disregarded.