Lullabies and Universality: An Ethnographic Review

Cross-Cultural Research • Vol/Iss. 58(5) • Sage Publications • • Published In • Pages: 411-446 •
By Aubinet, Stéphane

Abstract

Lullabies are often touted as universal to all human cultures, regardless of time and place. In order to test this axiom, this article examines all 186 societies in the Standard Cross-Cultural Sample, and codes them for the presence or absence of lullabies. The result ultimately hinges on the meaning of the word “lullaby”: when lullabies were defined as a strict and culturally conserved repertoire of songs sung to soothe infants, they were found to be neither a statistical nor even a “near” universal. However, when lullabies were defined as any type of singing used to soothe children, they were a near universal, with 96.8% of societies in the sample coded as having lullabies.

Samples

Sample Used Coded Data Comment
eHRAF World CulturesCombinationUsed as a search tool to access ethnographic data for SCCS cases, and to conduct a subsequent literature review focused on indigenous North American societies. eHRAF data was also supplemented with additional literature.
D-PLACEPolitical ComplexityUsed data on political complexity from the Ethnographic Atlas (Murdock, 1967)
Phylogenetic clustersOther ResearchersMinocher et al. 2019
Standard Cross-Cultural Sample (SCCS)CombinationUsed as a sampling frame

Hypotheses (7)

HypothesisSupported
When lullabies are defined broadly as any type of singing used to soothe or comfort children, they are a statistical universal across all human cultures.Supported
When lullabies are defined narrowly as a culturally conserved repertoire of songs sung to soothe infants, they are a statistical universal (or at least a near universal) across all human cultures.Partially Supported
Geographic regions will be a predictor of the presence of lullaby that are strictly defined.Supported
Highly “complex” societies, with higher political complexity, are more likely to have lullabies present.Supported
Proximity of societies, based on phylogenic affinity, will predict the likelihood of a society having presence of lullabies.Supported
The presence of lullabies will vary by subsistence type.Not Supported
Lullabies would be present across the majority of Native American societies.Partially Supported
Documents and Hypotheses Filed By: seb.wanggaouette  jonathan.zhang