It is perhaps easiest to make this clear by the example of language, which in many respects is one of the most important evidences of the history of human development. Primitive languages are, on the whole, complex. Minute differences in point of view are given expression by means of grammatical forms; and the grammatical categories of Latin, and still more so those of modern English, seem crude when compared to the complexity of psychological or logical forms which primitive languages recognize, but which in our speech are disregarded entirely. On the whole, the development of languages seems to be such, that the nicer distinctions are eliminated, and that it begins with complex and ends with simpler forms, although it must be acknowledged that opposite tendencies are not by any means absent (Boas).
Similar observations may be made on the art of primitive man. In music as well as in decorative design we find a complexity of rhythmic structure which is unequalled in the popular art of our day. In music, particularly, this complexity is so great, that the art of a skilled virtuoso is taxed in the attempt to imitate it (Stumpf). If once it is recognized that simplicity is not always a proof of antiquity, it will readily be seen that the theory of the evolution of civilization rests to a certain extent on a logical error. The classification of the data of anthropology in accordance with their simplicity has been reinterpreted as an historical sequence, without an adequate attempt to prove that the simpler antedates the more complex.
We are thus led to the conclusion that the assumption of a uniform development of culture among all the different races of man and among all tribal units is true in a limited sense only. We may recognize a certain modification of mental activities with modifications of form of culture; but the assumption that the same forms must necessarily develop in every independent social unit can hardly be maintained. Thus the question with which we began our consideration—namely, whether the representatives of different races can be proved to have developed each independently, in such a way that the representatives of some races stand on low levels of culture, while others stand on high levels of culture—may be answered in the negative. If we should make the attempt to arrange the different types of man in accordance with their industrial advancement, we should find representatives of the most diverse races—such as the Bushman of South Africa, the Veddah of Ceylon, the Australian, and the Indian of Terra del Fuego—on the same lowest level. We should also find representatives of different races on more advanced levels, like the negroes of Central Africa, the Indians of the Southwestern pueblos, and the Polynesians; and in our present period we may find representatives of the most diverse races taking part in the highest types of civilization. Thus it will be seen that there is no close relation between race and culture.
[6]. In a few localities in this district pottery is found, perhaps due to a late local introduction.
[7]. The cultural conditions of Melanesia Northwest America, and of some of the nomadic tribes of Africa, might thus be compared.
VIII. SOME TRAITS OF PRIMITIVE CULTURE
It now remains to formulate more clearly the difference between the forms of thought of primitive man and those of civilized man, regardless of their racial descent.
Even a superficial observation demonstrates that groups of man belonging to distinct social strata do not behave in the same manner. The Russian peasant does not re-act to his sense-experiences in the same way as does the native Australian; and entirely different from theirs are the re-actions of the educated Chinaman and of the educated American. In all these cases the form of re-action may depend to a slight extent upon hereditary individual and racial ability, but it will to a much greater extent be determined by the habitual re-actions of the society to which the individual in question belongs.