Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- List of contributors
- Foreword by Sue Taylor Parker
- Preface and acknowledgments
- I Historical, developmental, and comparative overviews
- II Pretense and imagination in children
- III Pretense and imagination in primates
- 13 Pretending in monkeys
- 14 Pretending primates: play and simulation in the evolution of primate societies
- 15 Representational capacities for pretense with scale models and photographs in chimpanzees (Pan troglodytes)
- 16 Pretending in free-ranging rehabilitant orangutans
- 17 Seeing with the mind's eye: eye-covering play in orangutans and Japanese macaques
- 18 Possible precursors of pretend play in nonpretend actions of captive gorillas (Gorilla gorilla)
- 19 Pretending culture: social and cognitive features of pretense in apes and humans
- 20 Empathy in a bonobo
- 21 Pretend play in a signing gorilla
- IV Prospects
- References
- Author Index
- Subject Index
19 - Pretending culture: social and cognitive features of pretense in apes and humans
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 13 August 2009
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- List of contributors
- Foreword by Sue Taylor Parker
- Preface and acknowledgments
- I Historical, developmental, and comparative overviews
- II Pretense and imagination in children
- III Pretense and imagination in primates
- 13 Pretending in monkeys
- 14 Pretending primates: play and simulation in the evolution of primate societies
- 15 Representational capacities for pretense with scale models and photographs in chimpanzees (Pan troglodytes)
- 16 Pretending in free-ranging rehabilitant orangutans
- 17 Seeing with the mind's eye: eye-covering play in orangutans and Japanese macaques
- 18 Possible precursors of pretend play in nonpretend actions of captive gorillas (Gorilla gorilla)
- 19 Pretending culture: social and cognitive features of pretense in apes and humans
- 20 Empathy in a bonobo
- 21 Pretend play in a signing gorilla
- IV Prospects
- References
- Author Index
- Subject Index
Summary
Understanding the origins of human symbolic behavior is an enduring quest. Little direct evidence addresses questions of how and why symbolic behavior originated, although lines of indirect evidence exist and numerous models and approaches have been offered (Lock & Peters, 1996). Among these has emerged a perspective that links our understanding of human origins with child cognitive development (Bruner, 1972; Gould, 1977; Parker & Gibson, 1979). This perspective, coupled with a focus on the evolution of cognition, has generated much recent research and scholarly attention (Bruner, Jolly & Sylva, 1976; Parker & Gibson, 1990; Mitchell, 1994a; Parker, Mitchell & Boccia, 1994; Parker & McKinney, 1999). This chapter addresses the evolution of child development with an emphasis on how its ecological contexts illuminate the evolution of a primary human symbolic domain – pretense. Further, we seek to map out connections between environmental influences on pretense and the role of pretense in the origin and persistent “reinvention” (Lock, 1980) of human symbolic culture.
Connections among play, children, the modern human mind, and culture are well appreciated. The primary adaptive aspects of our species are born within childhood, normally rich with opportunities for play and learning (Bruner, 1972), and symbolic play shares structural similarities with cultural phenomena such as myth and ritual (Bateson, 1955/1972; Turner, 1974; Geertz, 1976; Schwartzmann, 1978; Johnson, 1988). Often through pretend play (Goldman, 1998), children are transformative agents in symbolic culture (Valsiner, 1988), transforming even language (Bickerton, 1990, 1998).
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- Information
- Pretending and Imagination in Animals and Children , pp. 269 - 279Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2002