Gift Giving

Gift Giving

GIFT GIVING. The exchange of gifts is one of the most telling characteristics of human culture and, according to some authorities, may form the original basis of economics. From a religious perspective, gift giving has two primary aspects with many variations. First, gift giving is incorporated in a variety of ways within the religious customs and sanctions that regulate social behavior. Second, in the sense of offering, gift giving is an essential aspect of sacrifices ritually presented to a deity or deities. In both aspects the process of gift giving may involve distribution of the gift within the selected social group to which it is appropriate; it may also entail the destruction of all or part of the thing given, to signify its disappearance into the metaphysical realm.

The Potlatch as a Model for Gift Giving

With regard to the social aspect of gift giving, Marcel Mauss's Essai sur le don (1925), translated as The Gift (1954), shows gift giving to be the very means by which value can be taught and understood in a society, provoking humans to productivity but at the same time inspiring a sense of an intangible presence in the things distributed. Mauss seems to regard the potlatch—an elaborate celebration entailing the lavish display and distribution of the host's possessions—as the most significant form of gift giving, possessing both religious significance and profound consequences for the development of economic systems.

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