1002:3.1.2
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1002:3.1.2 [2019/09/23 21:09] – [Moka exchange in the Highlands] Ryan Schram (admin) | 1002:3.1.2 [Unknown date] (current) – removed - external edit (Unknown date) 127.0.0.1 | ||
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- | ~~DECKJS~~ | ||
- | # Gifts as a total social phenomenon | ||
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- | ## Gifts as a total social phenomenon | ||
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- | Ryan Schram | ||
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- | ANTH 1002: Anthropology in the world | ||
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- | Module 3, Week 1, Lecture 2 | ||
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- | Social Sciences Building (A02), Room 410 | ||
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- | ryan.schram@sydney.edu.au | ||
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- | September 25, 2019 | ||
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- | Available at http:// | ||
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- | ## Reciprocity is everywhere | ||
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- | Reciprocity is not something that one only finds in a few societies. Even societies which have created the possibility of individualism, | ||
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- | Even if people do not speak of their relationships or the institutions of society in terms of obligations of reciprocity, | ||
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- | ## Gifts are a total social phenomenon | ||
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- | Gifts come with obligations. Specifically, | ||
- | obligation**: | ||
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- | * The obligation to **give** | ||
- | * The obligation to **receive** | ||
- | * The obligation to **reciprocate**, | ||
- | given. | ||
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- | Mauss says that these obligations arise from the fundamental fact that society is **a system of total services** in which everything one does is for someone else, and other people do everything for you. It is a state of total interdependence. | ||
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- | ## Quiz question: One of these things is not like the other | ||
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- | Go to Canvas and take **Quiz 14: That's not reciprocity**. | ||
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- | The quiz has an answer which Ryan thinks is " | ||
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- | Ryan will reveal the password in class. | ||
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- | ## Yam gardening in Auhelawa | ||
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- | People of Auhelawa grow a variety of indigenous and introduced crops, but everyone grows these two species of yam: | ||
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- | * *ʻwateya* ([[https:// | ||
- | * *halutu* ([[https:// | ||
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- | A harvest of *ʻwateya* is divided into (1) gifts to other kin, (2) seed lines for one's children, (3) food for one's family. *Halutu* is similar ranked and classified, and the best of the harvest is given as a gift. | ||
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- | ## Moka exchange in the Highlands | ||
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- | The *moka* (and the *potlatch* as described by Eriksen) is a system of total services of an **agonistic** type. | ||
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- | Agonistic means that the sides in an exchange are competing to give | ||
- | more services to the other, and to raise the stakes of reciprocity. | ||
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- | Moka exchanges make people' | ||
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- | ## Reciprocity is everywhere | ||
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- | When one lives in a society based on buying and selling, one is trained to see oneself as an individual, and one becomes blind to the ways in which one is part of a system of total services. Yet all societies at some level are systems of total services, even if their members can't see this or don't want to see this. | ||
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- | ## References | ||
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- | Nairn, Charlie. 1976. *Ongka’s Big Moka*. Granada Television. http:// | ||
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1002/3.1.2.1569298150.txt.gz · Last modified: 2019/09/23 21:09 by Ryan Schram (admin)