ABSTRACT
The synthetic theories that are currently being advanced to explain geographical distributions oflanguage, culture, and physical type, and the relationships among them, are weak and contradictory and are not necessarily the most appropriate for the task. I would characterize these theories as cladistic in nature and suggest that they contain theoretical premises that are largely unexamined (Hull 1984) . Theories that are cladistic (from the Greek clados for "branch") should be contrasted with others that are rhizotic (from the Greek rhizafor "root") (Liddell and Scott 1940:955,1570). Cladistic theories emphasize the significance of a historical process by which daughter populations, languages, or cultures are derived from a parent group. Rhizotic theories emphasize the extent to which each human language, culture, or population is considered to be derived from or rooted in several different antecedent groups. I believe the term ethnogenesis best describes the latter process (Moore 1994b).
