Statistical Classification in Anthropology: An Application to Ethnomusicology
Linton C. Freeman, Alan P. Merriam · American Anthropologist · 1956
WHILE a growing interest in the application of statistics to cultural anthropology is indicated by the current literature (Driver 1953; Clem-e n t ~1954), it is only relatively recently that such processes have received any widespread attention from cultural anthropologists. The earliest applica-tion was made by Tylor (1889), but Driver and Kroeber (1932) with their trait-element list were the forerunners of the current trend which has cul-minated in Murdock's extensive study of the interrelationships among various aspects of social structure (1949). With the development of the Cross Cultural Survey a t Yale as well as the Human Relations Area Files, statistical treat-ment of cultural materials has become relatively common (Anon. 1954a); the importance of the trend is perhaps best indicated by the fact that an entire section of the 1954 meeting of the American Statistical Association was de-voted to "The Use of Statistics in Anthropological Studies " (Anon. 1954b). Most statistical studies in cultural anthropology have been relational. They have attempted to determine the degree of association which exists be-tween two or more cultural variables through application of the techniques