Behavioral Modernity - Definition

Definition

Modern human behavior is observed in cultural universals which are the key elements shared by all groups of people throughout the history of humanity. Examples of elements that may be considered cultural universals are language, religion, art, music, myth, cooking, games, and jokes. While some of these traits distinguish Homo sapiens from other species in their degree of articulation in language based culture, some have analogues in animal ethology. Since cultural universals are found in all cultures including some of the most isolated indigenous groups, scientists believe that these traits must have evolved or have been invented in Africa prior to the exodus.

Classic archaeologically-accessible evidence of behavioral modernity includes:

  • finely-made tools
  • fishing
  • evidence of long-distance exchange or barter among groups
  • systematic use of pigment (such as ochre) and jewelry for decoration or self-ornamentation
  • figurative art (cave paintings, petroglyphs, figurines)
  • game playing and music
  • foods being cooked and seasoned instead of being consumed raw
  • burial

A more terse definition of the evidence is the behavioral B's: blades, beads, burials, bone toolmaking, and beauty.

Read more about this topic:  Behavioral Modernity

Famous quotes containing the word definition:

    The definition of good prose is proper words in their proper places; of good verse, the most proper words in their proper places. The propriety is in either case relative. The words in prose ought to express the intended meaning, and no more; if they attract attention to themselves, it is, in general, a fault.
    Samuel Taylor Coleridge (1772–1834)

    Although there is no universal agreement as to a definition of life, its biological manifestations are generally considered to be organization, metabolism, growth, irritability, adaptation, and reproduction.
    The Columbia Encyclopedia, Fifth Edition, the first sentence of the article on “life” (based on wording in the First Edition, 1935)

    Beauty, like all other qualities presented to human experience, is relative; and the definition of it becomes unmeaning and useless in proportion to its abstractness. To define beauty not in the most abstract, but in the most concrete terms possible, not to find a universal formula for it, but the formula which expresses most adequately this or that special manifestation of it, is the aim of the true student of aesthetics.
    Walter Pater (1839–1894)