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Title: Kinship structures create persistent channels for language transmission

Journal Article · · Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America
 [1];  [2];  [2];  [3];  [4];  [5];  [2]; ORCiD logo [6];  [2];  [7]; ORCiD logo [8]
  1. Santa Fe Institute, Santa Fe, NM (United States); Nanyang Technological Univ. (Singapore); Stockholm Resilience Center, Stockholm (Sweden)
  2. Nanyang Technological Univ. (Singapore)
  3. Univ. of Lausanne, Lausanne (Switzerland)
  4. Santa Fe Institute, Santa Fe, NM (United States); Nanyang Technological Univ. (Singapore); Medical Univ. of Vienna, Vienna (Austria); Complex Science Hub Vienna, Vienna (Austria); International Institute for Applied Systems Analysis, Laxenburg (Austria)
  5. The Ohio State Univ., Columbus, OH (United States)
  6. Santa Fe Institute, Santa Fe, NM (United States); Los Alamos National Lab. (LANL), Los Alamos, NM (United States)
  7. Genome Diversity and Diseases Lab., Jakarta (Indonesia); Univ. of Indonesia, Jakarta (Indonesia); Univ. of Sydney, Sydney, NSW (Australia)
  8. Massey Univ. (New Zealand)
+ Show Author Affiliations

Here, languages are transmitted through channels created by kinship systems. Given sufficient time, these kinship channels can change the genetic and linguistic structure of populations. In traditional societies of eastern Indonesia, finely resolved cophylogenies of languages and genes reveal persistent movements between stable speech communities facilitated by kinship rules. When multiple languages are present in a region and postmarital residence rules encourage sustained directional movement between speech communities, then languages should be channeled along uniparental lines. We find strong evidence for this pattern in 982 individuals from 25 villages on two adjacent islands, where different kinship rules have been followed. Core groups of close relatives have stayed together for generations, while remaining in contact with, and marrying into, surrounding groups. Over time, these kinship systems shaped their gene and language phylogenies: Consistently following a postmarital residence rule turned social communities into speech communities.

Research Organization:
Los Alamos National Laboratory (LANL), Los Alamos, NM (United States)
Sponsoring Organization:
Universities/Institutions; USDOE
Grant/Contract Number:
AC52-06NA25396
OSTI ID:
1411352
Report Number(s):
LA-UR-17-23693
Journal Information:
Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, Vol. 114, Issue 49; ISSN 0027-8424
Publisher:
National Academy of Sciences, Washington, DC (United States)Copyright Statement
Country of Publication:
United States
Language:
English
Citation Metrics:
Cited by: 12 works
Citation information provided by
Web of Science

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Cited By (3)

Sex-linked genetic diversity originates from persistent sociocultural processes at microgeographic scales. text January 2019
Ancient genomes show social and reproductive behavior of early Upper Paleolithic foragers journal October 2017
Sex-linked genetic diversity originates from persistent sociocultural processes at microgeographic scales journal August 2019

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Related Subjects

60 APPLIED LIFE SCIENCES
language
kinship
coevolution
cultural evolution
population genetics