About CES

The Cultural Evolution Society supports evolutionary approaches to culture in humans and other animals. The society welcomes all who share this fundamental interest, including in the pursuit of basic research, teaching, or applied work. We are committed to fostering an integrative interdisciplinary community spanning traditional academic boundaries from across the social, psychological, and biological sciences, and including archaeology, computer science, economics, history, linguistics, mathematics, philosophy and religious studies. We also welcome practitioners from applied fields such as medicine and public health, psychiatry, community development, international relations, the agricultural sciences, and the sciences of past and present environmental change. We have embraced the challenge of bringing members of these fields together under a shared interest in cultural evolution, based in rigorous science with strong theoretical foundations. Our inaugural meeting encourages contributions across a diversity of themes that may include:
  • Analysis of quantitative data to study cultural and historical dynamics, including economic history
  • Cognitive anthropology
  • Evolutionary psychology
  • Archaeology
  • Comparative studies of social learning/cultural transmission in humans and other animals
  • Evolution of cooperation
  • Experimental studies of social learning/cultural evolution
  • Modelling of cultural evolutionary dynamics
  • Neuroscience and biological approaches
  • Phylogenetic analysis of culture and language
  • Evolution of religious beliefs and practices
  • Evolution of language and languages
  • Real-world applications of cultural evolutionary knowledge