D-PLACE: A Global Database of Cultural, Linguistic and Environmental Diversity - Fig 1

<p><b>D-PLACE links cultural information to language classifications and phylogenies (a, c) and to geographic locations and environmental features (b, d). This allows users to consider the relative influence of cultural ancestry, spatial proximity, and environment on diverse cultural practices. For example, panels a and b illustrate variation among societies in their dependence on fishing relative to other subsistence activities, based on data from the Ethnographic Atlas (EA)</b> [<a href="http://www.plosone.org/article/info:doi/10.1371/journal.pone.0158391#pone.0158391.ref011" target="_blank">11</a>–<a href="http://www.plosone.org/article/info:doi/10.1371/journal.pone.0158391#pone.0158391.ref015" target="_blank">15</a>] <b>and the Binford Hunter-Gatherer dataset</b> [<a href="http://www.plosone.org/article/info:doi/10.1371/journal.pone.0158391#pone.0158391.ref016" target="_blank">16</a>,<a href="http://www.plosone.org/article/info:doi/10.1371/journal.pone.0158391#pone.0158391.ref017" target="_blank">17</a>]. <b>Panels c and d highlight diversity in the most common economic transaction at marriage, based on data from the EA. In addition to providing global results, D-PLACE allows users to focus a search on a particular geographic region or linguistic family. Here, results for societies speaking Pama-Nyungan languages (a, b) or Sino-Tibetan languages (c, d) are magnified and outlined in black boxes on the global tree and map.</b></p

Examples of data and tools relevant to the different types of analyses made possible by D-PLACE.

<p>Examples of data and tools relevant to the different types of analyses made possible by D-PLACE.</p

D-PLACE – the Database of Places, Language, Culture and Environment v1.0

<p>From the foods we eat, to who we can marry, to the types of games we teach our children, the diversity of cultural practices in the world is astounding. Yet, our ability to visualize and understand this diversity is often limited by the ways it traditionally has been documented and shared: on a culture-by-culture basis, in locally-told stories or difficult-to-access books and articles.</p> <p>D-PLACE, which stands for ‘Database of Places, Language, Culture, and Environment,’ represents an attempt to bring together this dispersed corpus of information. It aims to make it easy for individuals to contrast their own cultural practices with those of other societies, and to consider the factors that may underlie cultural similarities and differences.</p

An overview of some of the types of studies that the Database of Places, Language, Culture, and Environment (D-PLACE) may facilitate.

<p>An overview of some of the types of studies that the Database of Places, Language, Culture, and Environment (D-PLACE) may facilitate.</p