Potlatching

Joel Myhal English 803 Instructor Duffy 8-29-09 Reading Journal 1 “Potlatching” The allow in I read was titled “Potlatching” by Conrad Phillip Kottak. In the make Professor Kottack explains the “Potlatching” culture, which is a festive event within a regional exchange system among tribes of the North Pacific sea-coast of North America. Some tribes still participate in the potlatch, whatsoevertimes as a memorial to the deceased. The motivation behind the potlatch was for them to evolve prestigiousness by giving away such items as, food, blankets, pieces of bruiser and different items. The potlatch associated local individuals along the North Pacific soaring into a regional alliance and exchange network. Potlatching and intervillage exchange had adjustive functions, unheeding of the motivations of the individual participants. Certain tribes who were enjoying an especially good class had a surplus of subsistence ite ms, which it could trade for more durable wealth items, same blankets, canoes, or pieces of copper. wealthiness, in turn by organism distributed could be converted into prestige. Members of several villages were invited to any potlatch and got to take central status the resources that were given away.

Potlatching is a misunderstood practice according to round anthropologists who studied the tribe’s culture. They saw it not in terms of its apparent wastefulness, but in terms of its long run role as a cultural adaptive mechanism. Potlatching served to have got the development of socioeconomic stratifi cation, a system of social classes. wealth r! elinquished or destroyed was converted into a aerial item: prestige. Under capitalism, we reinvest our profits (rather than burning our cash), with the hope of expertness an additional profit. However, the potlatching tribes were content to relinquish their surpluses rather than use them to prolong the social distance between themselves and their fellow tribe members. When I think of another...If you want to get a full essay, tissue it on our website: OrderCustomPaper.com

If you want to get a full essay, visit our page: write my paper