ABSTRACT
The processes responsible for producing the similarities and differences among cultures have been the focus of much debate in recent years, as has the corollary issue of linking cultural data with the patterns recorded by linguists and by biologists working with human populations (eg, Romney 1957; Vogt 1964; Chakraborty et al 1976; Brace and Hinton 1981; Cavalli-Sforza and Feldman 1981; Lumsden and Wilson 1981; Ammerman and Cavalli-Sforza 1984; Boyd and Richerson 1985; Terrell 1986, 1988; Kirch and Green 1987, 2001; Renfrew 1987, 1992, 2000b, 2001; Atkinson 1989; Croes 1989; Bateman et al 1990; Durham 1990, 1991, 1992; Moore 1994b; Cavalli-Sforza and Cavalli-Sforza 1995; Guglielmino et al 1995; Laland et al 1995; Zvelebil 1995; Bellwood 1996a, 2001; Boyd et al 1997; Shennan 2000,2002; Smith 2001; Whaley 2001; Terrell et al 2001; Jordan and Sherman 2003). To date, this debate has concentrated on two competing hypotheses, which have been termed the ‘genetic’, ‘demic diffusion’, ‘branching’ or ‘phylogenesis’ hypothesis, and the ‘cultural diffusion’, ‘blending’ or ‘ethnogenesis’ hypothesis (Romney 1957; Vogt 1964; Kirch and Green 1987; Moore 1994a, 1994b, 2001; Guglielmino et al 1995; Bellwood 1996b; Collard and Shennan 2000; Hewlett et al 2002).
