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Cultural primatology comes of age

Nature volume 399, pages 635–636 (1999)Cite this article

The chimpanzee keeps inching closer to humanity. After decades of patiently gathering information, the heads of seven field-sites pool their knowledge to reveal the astonishing variation in tool technology and social customs in chimpanzees across Africa.

The question of whether animals have culture is a bit like asking whether chickens can fly. Compared with an albatross or a falcon, perhaps not, but chickens do have wings, they do flap them, and they can get up in the trees. Similarly, viewed from the cultural heights achieved by humans in art, cuisine, science and politics, other animals seem to be nowhere in sight. But what if we change perspective, and don't measure them by our standards? This is what Kinji Imanishi, a Japanese anthropologist, proposed in the early 1950s1. In an imaginary debate between an evolutionist, a layman, a monkey and a wasp, Imanishi suggested that culture — defined as the non-genetic transmission of habits — was entirely possible, and even likely, for animals other than humans.

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Figure 1: Japanese monkey washing potatoes.
Figure 2: Transmitting culture — this chimpanzee shares the nut that she has just cracked open.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Living Links, The Yerkes Regional Primate Research Center and Department of Psychology, Emory University, Atlanta, 30329, Georgia, USA

    Frans B. M. de Waal

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  1. Frans B. M. de Waal
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de Waal, F. Cultural primatology comes of age. Nature 399, 635–636 (1999). https://doi.org/10.1038/21310

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