About hrafARC

The HRAF Advanced Research Centers (hrafARC) aim to promote basic and applied research in anthropology and to encourage and support comparative and cross-cultural research. More specifically, hrafARC aims to further the development of anthropology through comparative knowledge based on testable theory, sound research design and systematic methods for the collection and analysis of data. We seek to fulfill the historic mission of anthropology to describe and explain the range of variation in human biology, society, and culture across time and space. 

The main headquarters is at the Human Relations Area Files (HRAF) building in New Haven, CT (755 Prospect Street).  HRAF is a nonprofit membership consortium affiliated with Yale University.  Carol R. Ember directs hrafARC in New Haven and Michael Fischer directs hrafARC  in the UK--see http://hrafarc.eu/.

hrafARC Projects

iKLEWS (2021-2023)

iKLEWS (Infrastructure for Knowledge Linkages from Ethnography of World Societies) is a HRAF project funded by the National Science Foundation. iKLEWS will create semantic infrastructure and associated computer services for a growing textual database (eHRAF World Cultures). The basic goal is to greatly expand the value of eHRAF World Cultures to users who seek to understand the range of possibilities for human understanding, knowledge, belief and behaviour with respect to real-world problems we face today, such as: climate change; violence; disasters; epidemics; hunger; and war. Understanding how and why cultures vary in the range of possible outcomes in similar circumstances is critical to improving policy, applied science, and basic scientific understandings of the human condition... Read more...

Social Resilience to Nuclear Winter. (2018-2020)

This project employs archaeological and historical information to examine societal resilience to a catastrophic atmospheric event that block the sun and cooled the Northern Hemisphere by roughly 1 degree centigrade, creating widespread social disruption.  Peregrine uses this event as a proxy for the expected atmospheric impact of a limited nuclear war in Europe and seeks to identify strategies of resilience by examining those societies that survived, and failed to survive, the A.D. 536 event.  Read more...

Natural Hazards and Cultural Transformations. (2015-2019)

Researchers from cultural anthropology, archaeology, psychology, geography and climatology conducted three types of comparisons--a worldwide cross-cultural comparison using ethnographic data, an diachronic archaeological comparison of 32 traditions before and after major severe climate events, and a comparison of countries.  We are looking at a broad variety of possible cultural transformations in response to hazards.  These range from diet and subsistence diversity, property systems, mutual aid, political economy, general cultural “tightness" and beliefs about gods involvement with weather.  All of these domains have been newly coded for this project.   Read more ...

hrafARC Data Repository

2017

Peregrine, Peter N. 2017. “Political Participation and Long-Term Resilience in Pre-Columbian Societies.”  Disaster Prevention and Management 26(3).  1108/DPM-01-2017-0013

• Codebook
• Social Transformation Data (SPSS)
• Raw Data (SPSS) and Index Commands (SPSS)
• Social Transformation Data (csv)
• Raw Data (csv)

2018

Ember, Carol R., Ian Skoggard, Erik J. Ringen, and Megan Farrer. 2018. "Our Better Nature:  Does Resource Stress Predict Beyond-Household Sharing?" Evolution & Human Behavior 39 (4): 380-391. https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1090513817302489

• Codebook
• Data (SPSS) 
• Data (csv)

Peregrine, Peter N. 2018 "Social Resilience to Climate-Related Disasters in Ancient Societies: A Test of Two Hypotheses." Weather, Climate and Society 10(1): 145-161.  https://doi.org/10.1175/WCAS-D-17-0052.1

Peregrine, Peter N. 2019. "Reducing Post-Disaster Conflict: A Cross-Cultural Analysis Using Archaeological Data."  Environmental Hazards, 18:2, 93-110, DOI: 10.1080/17477891.2018.1476317

• Codebook
• Social Transformation Data (SPSS)
• Raw Data (SPSS) and Index Commands (SPSS)
• Social Transformation Data (csv)
• Raw Data (csv)

2019

Ember, Carol R., Eric C. Jones, Ian Skoggard and Teferi Abate Adem. 2019. "Warfare, Atrocities, and Political Participation: Eastern Africa."
Journal of Aggression, Conflict and Peace Research 11(1):11-23, https://doi.org/10.1108/JACPR-05-2017-0290

• Codebook
• Data for Eastern African Sample (SPSS) and Worldwide Sample (SPSS)
• Data for Eastern African Sample (csv) and Worldwide Sample (csv)

Felzer, B.S., Ember, C.R., Chiang, R., and Jiang, M. 2019. The relationships of extreme precipitation and temperature events with ethnographic reports of droughts and floods in nonindustrial societies. Weather, Climate, and Society. Early release at: https://doi.org/10.1175/WCAS-D-19-0045.1 

• readme_final_excel.docx
• ThrIndS_Combined_ann.xlsx
• rx5s_Combined_ann.xlsx
• rx1s_Combined_ann.xlsx
• SDIIS_Combined_ann.xlsx
• ThrIndS_tmin_combined.xlsx
• csdi_combined_ann.xlsx
• CDS_Combined_ann.xlsx
• CDD_CWD_Combined.xlsx
• CSDI_Combined.xlsx
• tmax_combined.xlsx
• SPSS_indices.xlsx
• SPSS_PCM.xlsx
• coef_var.xlsx
• allfactors.xlsx

2020

Ember, Carol R., Teferi Abate Adem, Tahlisa Brougham, and Emily Pitek. 2020. “Predictors of land privatization: Cross-cultural tests of defendability and resource stress theory” American Anthropologist. Forthcoming. 

• EmberEtAl-2019-LandTenure-Supplement.docx
• Data (SPSS)
• Data (csv)