This is a Preprint and has not been peer reviewed. This is version 1 of this Preprint.
This is a Preprint and has not been peer reviewed. This is version 1 of this Preprint.
Environments have facilitated diversification in human cultures, including folklore. Previous studies show that folklore may transmit folk-zoological knowledge about the local environment. However, it remains unclear whether and how environmental factors are related to animal distributions of folklore. By systematically and quantitatively analyzing large databases in both ecology and folkloristics, we compare the distributions of real animals and those of trickster animals, a common folkloristic motif. The result shows that the distribution of trickster animals is restricted by the presence of trickster animals in the neighborhood, and, more importantly, the presence of real animals. Given that the distributions of real animals are restricted by environmental factors, annual mean temperature and precipitation, these environmental factors indirectly restrict the distribution of trickster animals. This study demonstrates the importance of combining perspectives from both human science and ecology to understand nature's contribution to people.
https://doi.org/10.32942/X2Q305
Arts and Humanities, Ecology and Evolutionary Biology
folklore, species distribution, cultural evolution, Nature's contribution to people
Published: 2023-03-15 05:28
Last Updated: 2023-03-15 09:28
CC BY Attribution 4.0 International
Conflict of interest statement:
None
Data and Code Availability Statement:
The original data on folklore is available from Dr. Yuri Berezkin. The codes used in this manuscript is available from https://github.com/ShotaSHIBASAKI/DistributionTrickSter.
There are no comments or no comments have been made public for this article.