|
|
The History of Melanesian Society
Contents:
Show Summary
Hide Summary
Historical SummaryAccording to a native informant and participant in a potlatch among the Tlingit the hosts gave away about $11,000 worth of property in addition to sums contributed, according to custom, by other members of their clan:
While the other property was being gotten out they paid the principal guests one or two hundred dollars apiece just for dancing. Sometimes a man felt dissatisfied with what he had received and started to walk out.
Then the host went in front of him "with a dead man’s name" (i.e., mentioning the name of a dead relative), made him sit down, and doubled the amount of property given to him. It took four days to give out the blankets. As a man’s name was called out he would answer "Hade" ("this way"), equivalent to English "here." At such times the host brought out his brother-in-law or his child and put him on the property before it was distributed. This was to make him high caste, for it would be afterwards said of him that so many blankets "were lost to see him."1
The property distributed is, however, by no means lost, since the guests will give a return potlatch in which they will attempt to flatten the names of their hosts by a still more expensive distribution. The potlatch may therefore be regarded in one of its aspects as a money-making enterprise.
1Swanton, J.R., n/an/an/an/a "Social Conditions, Beliefs, and Linguistic Relationship of the Tlingit Indians." Bur. Amer. Ethnol., Ann. Rep., 442.
Contents:
Chicago:
"The History of Melanesian Society," The History of Melanesian Society in Primitive Behavior: An Introduction to the Social Sciences, ed. Thomas, William I. (New York: McGraw-Hill Book Company, Inc., 1937), Original Sources, accessed June 30, 2025, http://www.originalsources.com/Document.aspx?DocID=1IW1NTNC8FLKA7U.
MLA:
. "The History of Melanesian Society." The History of Melanesian Society, in Primitive Behavior: An Introduction to the Social Sciences, edited by Thomas, William I., New York, McGraw-Hill Book Company, Inc., 1937, Original Sources. 30 Jun. 2025. http://www.originalsources.com/Document.aspx?DocID=1IW1NTNC8FLKA7U.
Harvard:
, 'The History of Melanesian Society' in The History of Melanesian Society. cited in 1937, Primitive Behavior: An Introduction to the Social Sciences, ed. , McGraw-Hill Book Company, Inc., New York. Original Sources, retrieved 30 June 2025, from http://www.originalsources.com/Document.aspx?DocID=1IW1NTNC8FLKA7U.
|