Why cultures change - video UCL
-
- 역사
Archaeology and History are among many academic fields dedicated to the scrutiny, description and characterization of how cultures change; typically, practitioners show a lot of interest in why particular changes happen, but the problem of why they happen at all is rarely addressed except in the context of debate over whether the laws of evolution, or some similar laws, govern culture.
The lecturer raids not just history and archaeology but a wide array of relevant disciplines, including ethology, primatology, biology and cognitive science, in an attempt to open previously unexplored and under-explored lines of enquiry and debate. He hopes to make new contributions to understanding change and the acceleration of change in cultural organisms generally and, especially, in human ones.
-
- video
Why cultures change - Video
Marking Holocaust Remembrance Day on 27 January, this lecture will focus on the status of genocide denial, working through a number of 20th and 21st century genocides. Industries of denial spring up to counter the claims of victims of ethnic cleansing and genocide. The deniers or revisionists could be treated as other eccentric authors have, like quirky conspiracy theorists. However, there seems to be something more sinister, more demanding of our attention, which requires a special attitude to its proponents. This lecture will move through a discussion of the ethical grounds for the special category of genocide as a political crime and its relation to human rights.