Suggested citation format:

Taylor, Paul Michael

1995 The Gift as Material Culture. (Edited by Patricia Thatcher and Paul Michael Taylor with Cynthia Adams
Hoover.) Yale-Smithsonian Reports on Material Culture, No. 4. New Haven, CT/Washington, D.C.: Yale-
Smithsonian Seminar on Material Culture. (Report of a Yale-Smithsonian Seminar held at the Smithsonian
Institution, April 28-30, 1991.)
 Yale-Smithsonian Reports on Material Culture
ISSN 1080- 0530

Copyright 1995 by The Yale-Smithsonian Seminar on Material Culture:

Smithsonian Institution, Washington, D.C.
Yale University, New Haven, Connecticut

Cover illustration: Ceremonial cloth (tam pan or "ship cloth"),

Lampung, southern Sumatra.
See Figure 6, page 13.
Acknowledgments

Paul Michael Taylor and the Executive Committee of the Yale-Smithsonian

Seminar on Material Culture planned the seminar reported here. Abbott Low-
ell Cummings of Yale University and Cynthia Adams Hoover of the Smithson-
ian served as the principal organizing links between the two institutions. Fund-
ing was provided by the Center for the Study of American Art and Material
Culture at Yale and, at the Smithsonian, the Office of Robert Hoffmann, Assis-
tant Secretary for Research, and the Office of International Relations. Publica-
tion of this report was supported by the Chevron Companies and Texaco
Foundation through funding for the exhibition "Beyond the Java Sea: Art of
Indonesia's Outer Islands." The editors thank Ruth Osterweis Selig for her
sound editorial advice and Joan Holleman for her excellent copy-editing.
 Contents

Paul Michael Taylor Preface 1

Paul Michael Taylor Introduction: Perspectives on the Gift

in Indonesia and Beyond 3

WEDDING GIFTS AND MARITAL ALLIANCES

Roy Hamilton A Tusk and a Set of Ornaments:

Exchange Goods in Lio Marriage Alliance 15

Maria Montoya Cultural Resistance in New Mexico:

The Case of Las Entriegas de Novios 19

Mary Jo Arnoldi Bride's Wealth: A Woloma and the

Invention of a Tradition 22

Candace Waid Southern Ceremonial Gifts 25

GIFTS IN ECONOMIC PERSPECTIVE

Leopold Pospisil Gift or Loan: Kapauku Papuan Money

Transactions and Their Economic and Political Significance 29

George Miles Real Gifts: Treaties, Grants, and Land Transfers in America 30

John Fleckner Greeting Cards and American Consumer Culture 33

Jean-Christophe Agnew The Gift of Giving: Philanthropy in America 38

POWER AND PROPITIATION:

POLITICAL AND RELIGIOUS ASPECTS OF G IFT GIVING

Lorraine V Aragon Giving to Get: Tributes and Offerings

in Central Sulawesi, Indonesia 41

Helen Ibbitson Jessup Indonesian Court Arts 45

A lan Fern Presidential Gifts in America 48

Gretchen Townsend Colonial Boston Church Silver:

Gifts of Community, Commitment, and Continuity so

Conclusion and Questions for Further Study 53

Invited Participants 54

Selected References 56
 Figures

1. Map of Indonesia 4
2. The "male" gift: a knife and scabbard (piso) of the Toba Batak,
North Sumatra 8
3. The "female" gift: a ceremonial ulos cloth ( ulos simpar) of the Toba Batak,
North Sumatra 9
4. Ceremonial textile (pua), Iban ("Dayak"), northern Borneo 12

5· Figure for atonement (adu horo), Central Nias 13

6. Ceremonial cloth (tam pan or "ship cloth"),
Lampung, southern Sumatra 13
7· Ancestor figure (adu), South Nias 14
8. Bridewealth negotiations in Wolotopo, 1988 15
9· Exchanges between kin groups allied in marriage 18
10. Contemporary handwoven cotton textile from Mali 23
11. Masquerade costume from Mali 24
12. Nineteenth-century valentines by Esther Howland,
Worcester, Massachusetts 33
13. Christmas card promotion design by nineteenth-century entrepreneur
Lewis Prang 34
14. Father's Day card by Rustcraft, 1935 36
15. Father's Day card by Rustcraft, 1935 37
16. "Rustie;' living trademark of Rustcraft in the 1950s 37
17. Gifts of food to deities, Central Sulawesi 42
18. Painted barkcloth head scarf and blouse, tribute gifts,
Central Sulawesi 43
19. Salvation Army mother-and-infant clinic, Central Sulawesi 44
20. Central Sulawesi highlanders delivering gifts to Protestant God 44
21. Kris Nagasapto, mid-seventeenth century, Surakarta, Central Java 46
22. Kris Nagasasra, seventeenth century, Cirebon, West Java 47
23. Silver Indian Peace Medal, 1825, by Moritz Furst, from presidency
of John Quincy Adams 48
24. President Harry S Truman, as sculpted in coconut
by Puerto Rican artist 49
25. Standing cup manufactured by Paul Revere, 1758, as gift from Reverend
Thomas Prince to his congregation 50
26. Communion plate from First Church, Boston 51
27. Standing cup of English manufacture, 1610- 11, presented to First Church,
Boston, by John Winthrop 52
28. Silver beakers, c. 1713- 88, First Church, Hatfield, Massachusetts 53
Preface The 1991 Yale-Smithsonian Seminar on Material Culture, held in Washington,
D.C., April 28-30, examined gifts as objects of material culture. The meeting
Paul Michael Taylor was held in conjunction with the Smithsonian exhibition at the National Mu-
seum of Natural History, Beyond the Java Sea: Art of Indonesia's Outer Islands,
an exhibition whose objects stimulated much discussion and new thinking
about material culture.
The seminar participants represented a broad range of disciplines and in-
cluded historians, materials scientists, anthropologists and archaeologists, lit-
erary scholars, and art historians. As discussed in the introductory paper, many
of Indonesia's finest artworks were created originally as gifts, as a kind of cur-
rency in systems of gift exchange. Consequently, the exhibition and its accom-
panying catalog (Taylor and Aragon 1991) examined indigenous concepts of
reciprocity, as materially represented in gifts, for maintaining (or indeed ma-
nipulating) the social order in outer-island Indonesia. The Indonesian exam-
ples and the anthropological and art-historical methods used to explore them
illuminated the seminar discussions of the gift from elsewhere, as examined by
other methods, which, in turn, suggested new interpretations of the objects ex-
hibited.
The seminar began Sunday evening (April 28, 1991) with an introductory
slide presentation, "Perspectives on the Gift in Indonesia and Beyond," fol-
lowed by a viewing and discussion of the exhibition. The lecture, exhibition,
and discussion all made reference to feasting upon the occasion of gift ex-
changes, an appropriate introduction to the festive dinner that followed in the
Museum of Natural History's Associates Court.
The next two days of stimulating papers, discussions, and meals were orga-
nized into three panels:

• Wedding Gifts and Marital Alliances

• Gifts in Economic Perspective
• Power and Propitiation: Political and Religious Aspects of Gift Giving.

As the Indonesian exhibition provided a point of comparison for the entire

topic, so the panels began with one or more Indonesian case studies, each pre-
sented by an Indonesianist (anthropologists Hamilton, Aragon, and Pospisil
and art historian Jessup). Consequently, each group of essays in this seminar
report begins with an Indonesian case study, and then broadens the discussion
to include examples from other parts of the world, as examined by scholars
from American studies, history, art history, anthropology, literature, and other
fields.

Wedding Gifts and Marital Alliances

The discussion of Wedding Gifts and Marital Alliances opens with Roy
Hamilton's vivid account of a Lio marriage ceremony from Flores Island in the
Lesser Sundas. Hamilton's account illustrates that, even where the rules of gift
exchange at traditional weddings seem precise and ritualized, lively negotia-
tions and individual manipulation of those same detailed rules do prevail "on
the ground." Maria Montoya describes the multiple stages of, and exchanges
that take place in, a folk Catholic ceremony (called Las Entriegas de Novios) that
served to sanction marriage in Hispanic New Mexico. She presents this cere-
mony, which persists today in modern urban contexts, as a form of "cultural
resistance" to outsiders.

1
 Candace Waid examines wedding-related gifts in Southern U.S. novels, such
as those by Katherine Anne Porter, Carson McCullers, and Eudora Welty. Mary
Jo Arnoldi describes a woman's exchange ceremony called woloma among the
Bamana of Mali. Wedding goods are exchanged in the woloma, on the day of
the wedding. Arnoldi's description of the woloma ceremony is a refreshing al-
ternative to male-dominated discussions about "brideprice" exchange, since
the woloma is organized by women, and women use the ceremony to exchange
goods among themselves.

Gifts in Economic Perspective

Leopold Pospisil opens the second panel on Gifts in Economic Perspective
with his essay on the role of gifts and gift-like transactions among the Kapauku
of western New Guinea (now Indonesia's easternmost province, Irian Jaya).
Pospisil shows that this exchange behavior is associated with both legal and
moral expectations, but that the two m ust carefully be distinguished.
George Miles's essay on "Real Gifts: Treaties, Grants, and Land Transfers in
America" also considers various forms of property transfer in terms of the
bundles of rights, duties, and even moral expectations being transferred, as, for
example, in homestead grants and grants to railroads. He also examines ex-
changes taking place between peoples with entire but different systems of
defining property rights, as, for example, when rights in land were transferred
from American Indians to Euro-Americans who had very different concepts of
what that transfer entailed.
Although he focuses on gifts of much tinier scale, historian John Fleckner's
discussion, "Greetings Cards and American Consumer Culture," provoked the
most heated discussion. Fleckner traces the history of this relatively new and
seemingly inconsequential form of material culture that is now ubiquitous.
While some seminar participants compared this phenomenon to Indonesian
textiles (some of which are also created only to be given away, or to say things
that the wearer cannot say), others depicted the greeting card as a cheap token
that subtly implies that the recipient deserves no better.
The panel's concluding paper, "The Gift of Giving: Philanthropy in Amer-
ica" by Jean-Christophe Agnew, questions the pure philanthropy of even the
most stupendous gifts. Agnew closely examines the antagonism within our cul-
ture between commodities and gifts, finding the two "incommensurable al-
though not incompatible," since the intricate calculations accompanying pri-
vate philanthropic gifts are of a different order from those accompanying
commodity exchange.

Power and Propitiation: Political and Religious Aspects of Gift Giving

The final panel, Power and Propitiation: Political and Religious Aspects of
Gift Giving, begins with two very different Indonesian case studies. Anthropol-
ogist Lorraine V. Aragon's paper on tributes and offerings in Central Sulawesi
Island examines the manner in which that region's political and religious gifts
to deities, highland aristocrats, and lowland kingdom rulers were used to con-
struct political and social relationships. She emphasizes that nonmaterial valu-
ables such as access to trade markets, religious blessing, or the status acquired
in gift giving must be recognized as important in gift exchange. Art historian
Helen Jessup's parallel essay on "Indonesian Court Arts" gives an overview of
courtly traditions of gift exchange as they were used in defining hierarchy or
equality among rulers or between rulers and subjects in Indonesian history.

2
 Turning to American history, Alan Fern's discussion of"Presidential Gifts in
such
America" favorably compares the simple and deeply meaningful gifts of the
tlary
earliest presidents to the "extraordinary escalation" of recent presidential gift
~the
giving. This trend recalls the escalating Cult of Magnificence in Indonesian
ty of
courts, as described by Jessup. Unlike some Indonesian court societies, how-
gal-
ever, Americans have not yet come to believe that the expensive heirlooms ac-
ince
quired as our rulers take office are actually the source of our president's au-
mge thority.
Gretchen Townsend's essay, "Colonial Boston Church Silver: Gifts of Com-
munity, Commitment, and Continuity," provides the conference's parting
thought, examining the colonial New England pattern of collecting money or
:tive
leaving money upon one's death for the purchase of church silver. She leaves us
uku
with a well-developed example of a meaningful type of gift, prominent in colo-
tya).
nial popular culture, which cannot easily be interpreted in terms of the implied
and
reciprocity and exchange that dominate most thinking about gifts. The donor
who bequeathed money for an inscribed silver vessel was, after all, already dead
when the transfer took place. And each Puritan donor knew that his fut ure sta-
tus, as someone who would or would not eternally be saved, was already prede-
termined before he made the bequest. Drawing her evidence from contempo-
rary writings and from her examination of the silver vessels, Townsend
presents a moving account of the many meanings these objects of a lifetime
conveyed.

As R E QUIRE D by Indonesian custom, the Smithsonian representatives at the

er's
seminar's opening and closing meals elaborately apologized for the poverty
the
and simplicity of the surroundings, the food, and the preparations, while
and
stressing the honor bestowed upon the hosts by the guests' presence. The Yale
)US.
visitors generously responded by inviting all present to New Haven for the fol-
aan
lowing year's annual Seminar on Material Culture, as spontaneous reciprocity
~gs has become the custom of this annual rite. In parting, I emphasized once again
ken
how honored and pleased I was that the Yale-Smithsonian Executive Commit-
tee shared my enthusiasm for "the gift" as a seminar topic and the exhibition as
ter-
a focus of attention for this year's magnificent gathering.
the
:ul-
al-
Introduction: The Yale-Smithsonian Seminar on Material Culture, held this year at the
!ri- Perspectives on the Gift in Indonesia Smithsonian in conjunction with the exhibition Beyond the Java Sea: Art of In-
mg donesia's Outer Islands, is an annual gathering of scholars interested in material
and Beyond
culture. The Yale-Smithsonian Executive Committee ventured into rather un-
Paul Michael Taylor familiar terrain this year, using this exhibition of objects from the other side of
the globe to provide the "springboard" into new thinking about m aterial cul-
of
ture. This conference and its resulting publication should help scholars think
ol-
in new ways about the gift as material culture, by applying their concepts to In-
·esi
donesian examples, and by broadening their thinking through exposure to the
work of Indonesianists.

Gift and Reciprocity in Indonesian Societies

"The gift" is central to this exhibition partly because anthropological inter-
an
pretations oflndonesian societies have so often considered reciprocity as a cen-
of
tral component of traditional Indonesian social organization. This is especially
or
true of literature concerning the more than three hundred ethnic groups in-

3
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Map by Marcia Bakry

Figure 1. Map of Indonesia. Java and Bali constitute Indonesia's "inner islands"; the others are "outer islands." (Map by Marcia Bakry.)
habiting Indonesia's so-called "outer islands," that is, all of Indonesia's islands
except the densely populated, more developed "inner islands" of Java and Bali
(figure 1).
Although ethnographers' interest in gift exchange remains strong, today's
writers recognize that the prominent place of gift giving in some models of In-
donesian social organization is outdated, because those models are dependent
on the generally discarded notion that "archaic" systems of exchange are fun-
damentally different from exchange systems at "higher" levels of sociopolitical
organization. Notions of archaic, gift-based economies may still be part of
popular notions of the "primitive;' but they have generally been no more use-
ful within anthropology than the search for "archaic" forms of grammar ever
was in linguistics.
One major reason that notions of reciprocity and gift exchange have been so
important in the interpretations of Indonesian life is that Indonesian people
themselves, as we shall see below, often emphasize exchange-based motives for
their activities. In fact, it might be possible to trace the importance of reciproc-
ity and marital alliance theory as key concepts in twentieth-century structural-
ism to the early twentieth-century Dutch accounts of Indonesian societies,
such as that of van Wouden (1968 [orig. Dutch 1938] ), now widely recognized
as a precursor of Levi-Strauss (see Levi-Strauss 1950, de Josselin de Jong 1970).
So, Indonesianists, including myself, have preserved these tropes in their work
not (or not only) because we inhabit some kind of intellectual backwater, but
because the people we study encourage us to do so. Those same people may be
partly responsible for the centrality of these concepts in models of social orga-
nization that are now applied to many other peoples.

Interpreting the Gift

Any history of the importance of"the gift" in interpretations of social orga-
nization must return to Mauss's Essai sur le don . .. , published in 1925, sixty-six
years ago (English trans. The Gift: Forms and Functions of Exchange in Archaic
Societies [Mauss 1967]). Mauss's work was influential in the development of
both Dutch and French schools of structuralism (via ].B. de Josselin de Jong
and F.A.E. van Wouden in Holland and Levi-Strauss in France), and therefore
influential in the predominant intepretations oflndonesian societies. I have al-
luded above to the fact that Mauss's seminal and inspirational ideas of reci-
procity as the basis of social organization are dependent on several generally
discarded notions, including the idea of "archaic" or so-called "primitive" sys-
tems of exchange. For our purposes, also, Mauss is decidedly quiet on the "ma-
terial" component of the gift as "material culture." But before adding other crit-
icisms, let me hasten to add that any of us here would be more than happy to
have our work the subject of some future conference, and there to have our
books called "seminal" and "inspirational," while also hearing them criticized
for their outmoded aspects- sixty-six years after our books were published!
One of the ways Mauss's thought is reflected in structuralist anthropology
generally, including its studies of Indonesian societies, is that societies are stud-
ied as unitary wholes, in which a limited range of social phenomena are seen as
"total social facts," considered as part of a total system like Mauss's "presta-
tions" or systems of exchange. A prestation refers to any thing (service, enter-
tainment, object, etc.) given as a gift or in exchange. Mauss hypothesized that,
even though the systems of transactions transferring objects (or services) pur-

5
port to be and appear to be voluntary, disinterested, and spontaneous, they are,
in fact, obligatory and interested within archaic societies.
Mauss's central hypothesis is that in the "archaic form of exchange," which
continues in modified form in all societies, there are three obligations: giving,
receiving, and repaying. The obligations involved in gift exchange are symboli-
cally expressed in myth and imagery and, of course, concretely represented by
the objects exchanged. For Mauss, the permanent significance or lasting
influence of the objects exchanged is due to the fact that they express the con-
tinual indebtedness that subgroups within segmentary societies of an archaic
type have toward each other.
Mauss's assumptions and hypotheses have had numerous repercussions in
studies of Indonesian societies. Our seminar considers "weddings and marital
alliances" as its starting point, followed by an examination of some "economic
aspects of the gift." In other words, we consider marital alliances as a category
separate from economic exchange. Yet in the interpretation of some of Mauss's
followers, marital exchanges constitute a subclass of the economic exchange
within "archaic" societies. The notion of"archaic" communities, in which every
member is intricately in debt to others along socially prescribed lines, rings
partly true to anyone who works in Indonesian villages- as it probably does to
those working anywhere in the global village. But increasingly today, interpre-
tations of social organization emphasize individual initiative, choice, and the
creative manipulation of a society's cultural and symbolic systems, in which
models of exchange merely form some of a society's ideal or abstract expres-
sions. This is even the case for such highly ritualized and rule-laden exchanges
as those accompanying customary Indonesian weddings, as shown by Roy
Hamilton's paper (below) on wedding gifts among the Lio of Flores (Lesser
Sunda Islands, Indonesia).
In Indonesian societies, the guardians of esoteric knowledge are the leaders
of traditional communities, upholders of tradition, of adat or custom. At the
heart of people's respect for tradition and custom lies a deep belief in tradi-
tional ideas regarding marriage, ancestors, and the spirit world. In each of these
three realms- marriage, ancestors, and the supernatural- lie reciprocal rela-
tionships: with family relations, with ancestors, and with the spirit world. Tra-
ditional respect for ancestors and ancestral ways is closely linked to respect for
reciprocity and mutual support in an individual's relationships with other peo-
ple and with other inhabitants of the natural and supernatural worlds. "Gifts,"
broadly defined, are the currency and the expression of that reciprocity and
mutual support. Hence, gift giving and reciprocity can be examined with re-
gard to each of these three realms.

Wedding Gifts and Marital A lliances

Since the time of the early Dutch structuralist tradition of F.A.E. van
Wouden, marital alliances have been considered the key to understanding the
underlying structures of Indonesian social organization. Indonesia is, in fact, a
hearthland of structuralism within anthropology. Structuralism is a metathe-
ory about societies that attempts to analyze social relations, or symbols, or
other com ponents of a society and its culture into structural elements and to
predict how the diversity of social customs can be derived from these underly-
ing structures.
In Types of Social Structure in Eastern Indonesia, van Wouden (1968 [orig.
Dutch 1938]) posited an original Eastern Indonesian social organization based

6
 upon descent groups whose members intermarried in prescribed ways. Con -
~y are,
sidering the example of a society consisting of patrilineal clans A, B, C, and D,
the women of clan A would be expected to marry the men of clan B, the
which wom en of B to marry the men of C, the women of C to marry into clan D, and
1vmg, the women of clan D to marry into clan A. This circular pattern of marriage
1boli- prescriptions can be considered a continuing marital alliance among the clans
ed by A through D, each of which was founded by a different ancestor. Just as ances-
tsting tors define families (as groups of people descended from those ancestors),
:con- marriage unites them. Diagrammatically:
·chaic
/A'\,
D B
ms in ""-c;
arital Following van Wouden, Dutch anthropologists of the Leiden school gave
tomic this system of exp ected marriages between clans the delightful name "circulat-
egory ing connubium," and described some of the most striking and pervasive fea-
auss's tures of asymmetric alliance within Eastern Indonesian society as resulting
1ange from it. From the perspective of a man or woman in clan "A," for example, one
every immediately sees from the diagram above the opposition between a clan from
nngs which p eople in A take their wives (D) and one into which they give their
Jes to women as wives (B). Throughout Indonesia, the wife-giver family is ritually su-
rpre- perior to the wife-taker family, but that kind of ritual superiority in circular
d the connubium is not the basis fo r social classes or ranks. A is superior to B, B to C,
ihich and C to D, but D is also ritually superior to A.
pres- Such alliances between families are asymmetric, because there must be at
mges least three families exchanging women- the simple (or symmetric) exchange
Roy between two families or clans is excluded. Furthermore, the relations between
,esser individuals in different clans are unequal because of the ritual superiority of
the wife givers. This "asymmetry" has even sometimes been invoked as a means
tders of explaining the Indonesian preference for asymmetry in art and architecture.
t the Some Indonesian groups themselves consciously make the association between
radi- their marital allian ce pattern and their architecture- for instance, representa-
these tives of the wife-giving group may sit on the right (larger) side in the host's tra-
rela- ditional house during ceremonies. Others have theorized that no single com-
Tra- ponent of the society (such as m arital alliance or economic exchange) is
:t for "primary" or should be called upon to explain all the others. For them, the un-
peo- derlying principles them selves are primary, and m arriage patterns are but one
ifts," way in which those principles are realized in any particular society. And m any
and scholars deny that the simple explanatory models derived today were models of
1 re-
any original Indonesian society that actually existed in the past. Instead, such
models are idealized pictures of how marital alliance works; these ideal models ·
differ from practice today and probably always have.
One pervasive interpretation of the gift as m aterial culture, frequently noted
van in objects in this exhibition, is the comm only reported identification of some
;the objects as male goods and other objects as fem ale goods, particularly those ob-
ct, a jects used in gift exchanges associated with marital alliance in Indonesia and
the- also in Melanesia (Niessen 1984, MacCormack and Strathern 1980, Strathern
;, or 1988) . In asymmetric alliance systems especially, there is a universal distinction
d to between male and female goods, often based on which gender m anufactures
~rly-
the good (thus females weave and textiles are female, and so on ). A m an in an
asymmetric alliance system who is in n eed of something frequently goes to his
Jrig. in-laws for h elp-and the kind of thing he needs determines to whom he di-
tsed

7

Figure 2 . The "male" gift: a knife and
scabbard (piso) of the Toba Batak,
North Sumatra. Wood, m etal, rattan,
32.5 x 9.5 x 3.2 em. One pervasive in-
terpretation of the gift as material
culture, frequently noted in objects in
the subject exhibition, is the com-
monly reported identification of some
objects as male goods and other ob-
jects as f emale goods, particularly
those objects used in gift exchanges
associated with m arital alliance in
Indonesia and also in M elanesia.
(Museum Nasional Indonesia,
Jakarta, 26866. Photograph by Diane
Nordeck, Smithsonian Institution.)
rects his request. He obtains male goods from the husbands of his sisters or
daughters ("wife takers") and female goods from his sons' wives or from the
brothers or father of his own wife (his "wife givers").
Perhaps intermarriage, and particularly the confusion or misinterpretation
that might result if gifts associated with marital exchanges were too different
from one place to another, h as contributed to the standardization of genders of
objects. That standardization is also undoubtedly related to the fact that smiths
and jewelry makers are generally male while weavers are almost universally fe-
male. Consequently, textiles are generally considered female, metal objects
such as weapons are generally male, and so on.
Nevertheless, it is an oversimplification to refer to an object in its entirety as
"female" or "male," even those objects called male and fem ale and used in mar-
ital exchanges. Male goods- especially the most important ones used in the
marriage ceremonies- often contain a female component, while female goods
contain a part that is clearly considered (even called) male. See, for example, an
archetypal pair of objects that could be used in marital exchanges among the
Batak: the piso or knife (figure 2), which is a male good given from the family of
the groom to the family of the bride, and the ulos or sacred cloth given from the
family of the bride to the family of the groom (figure 3). Note that the knife,
though a male good, contains both a m ale and a female figure. Similarly, each
ulos textile, though as a whole the object constitutes a female good, contains
one edge that is considered the "male" component (Niessen 1985).
If marital alliance gifts are representations of the families being united by
the marriage, then it not surprising that male and female compon ents occur
both in goods designated as so-called male and in those designated female. A
family that gives its daughter or sister in marriage to another family is giving
away its most valuable "female good." But, just as the "female" family includes
many male members (the bride's father, brothers, and so on), so the "female"
goods that represent it contain m ale elem ents.
Gifts in Economic Perspective
The more detailed discussions of gift giving within the context of marital al-
liances, or within the context of power and propitiation, always include an
"economic" component but are not limited to "purely" economic transactions.
A few economists m ay still refer, with Karl Polanyi (1944, The Great Transfor-
mation) , to a prior time in which exchange existed as purely "reciprocal ex-
change," later to be replaced (or rather supplem ented) by "redistributive ex-
change" (exchange that is politically en forced through an allocative center),
followed by "m arket exchange" (characterized by purchase and sale at a money
price determined by th e impersonal forces of supply and dem and) . Yet there is
no thoroughly "reciprocal exchange" -based society, in which transactions re-
quiring reciprocity purely follow the lines and groupings of the social struc-
ture.
Under such circumstances, Leopold Pospisil's intensive fieldwork studying
the economy of the Kapauku of Irian Jaya (Indonesia's easternmost province)
is particularly valuable (see Pospisil1963, 1978) . It is helpful that his paper in-
troduces this conference's comparative papers on the economic aspects of the
gift. He stresses the importance of individual initiative in economic transac-
tions, and he carefully explores the differences between "loan" and "gift," in
economic, legal, and locally perceived "moral" term s.
8
 Figure 3· The ''female" gift: a m ·emo-
:ers or
nial ulos cloth (ulos simpar) of the
m the
Toba Batak, North Sumatra. Cotton,
230 x 125 em. The ulos or sacred cloth
tation
given from the family of the bride to
ferent
the family of the groom is the arche-
lers of
typal "female" countergift to the
lmiths
"male" piso or knife given from the
~y fe- family of the groom to that of the
rjoct' bride. Yet it is an oversimplification
to refer to an object in its entirety as
·ety as
''female" or "male." The "male"
mar-
knife-and-scabbard set contains both
.n the
a male and a female figure. Similarly,
goods
each ulos textile, which as a whole
~le,an constitutes a female good, contains
tg the
one edge that is considered the
lily of
"male" component (shown at top
m the
here, as such textiles are usually
knife,
hung) and the opposite edge that is
each
considered ''female." (Collection of
ttains
Thomas Murray. Photograph by
Dennis Anderson, courtesy of
ed by
Thomas Murray.)
occur
e. A
vmg
ludes
nale"

a! ai-
le an
lOllS.
tsfor-
ex-
; ex-
ter),
oney
:re is Power, Propitiation, and the Role ofAncestors
s re- Another important area of artworks created for purposes of exchange, or to
uc- elicit exchanges, consists of objects that express the inequalities of power rela-
tionships, relationships requiring propitiation. Both Lorraine V. Aragon and
ring Helen Ibbitson Jessup present useful papers in this area. Aragon offers a com -
nee) pelling interpretation of the multiple and changing m eanings of gifts between
: in- the highland and lowland societies of Central Sulawesi. Moving generally
. the (though not exclusively) "downriver" to Indonesia's court societies (or across
sac- the seas to Java, wh ere they flourish) , Helen Jessup examines the ways in which
111 gift giving is used by people in Indonesian court societies to establish, main-
tain, and confer status.

9
Figure ]a. Detail offigure 3 showing
the "male" section of the textile.

Figure 3b. Detail offigure 3 showing

the "female" section of the textile.

10
 There is, however, another area of regular prestations in which outer-island
Indonesian ideas of reciprocity, expressed through gift giving, embody rela-
tionships of power. This area is strongly represented by gifts (or altars for gift
giving) in the exhibition, and involves artworks that relate to the spirit world,
particularly works created to keep up reciprocal relations between the world of
the living and the world of ancestors.
Departed ancestors are the foci of the family, and ancestors are sometimes
founders of entire ethnic groups. They are integrated into everyday life
through many magnificent art forms, including carved stone ancestral altars,
wooden freestanding sculptures, demonic ancestor imagery on carved poly-
chrome shields and incised bamboo utensils, and (especially in Borneo and
Irian Jaya) artistic and ritual treatment of the corpses or skulls of the deceased.
Ancestors define the clans and other groups descended from them. Ancestors
join other spirits and continue to interact with the living. Yet every person's
path through life brings him eventually to death, the point at which he joins
the ancestors, a passage in which he is aided by the living who survive him. The
continuous interaction between the living and the dead begins with the funeral
ceremomes.
In most outer-island societies, funerary rituals are extensive. Pre-Christian
or pre-Islamic Batak funerary ceremonies, for example, served to pacify the de-
ceased and to elevate his or her rank among the ancestors in the upper world.
The expected reciprocity in relationships among the living continued in a
modified form after death. The funerary ceremonies particularly served to
mollify the deceased, to satisfy his or her needs, and therefore to encourage the
deceased to aid living relatives.
People of all social strata throughout the outer islands tradition ally turned
to ancestors as protectors, but often the most lavish monuments to ancestors
were erected by the aristocracy, partly because of their greater control of wealth
and partly because the founding ancestors gave them the charter for their su-
periority. People of all classes still stress the importance of the interaction be-
tween the living and the ancestors by displaying and invoking ancestor images.
The Nias wooden ancestor sculptures (adu), which are attached to posts or wall
altars inside the houses of commoners as well as chiefs, function as intermedi-
aries for contact with spirits. Through the medium of these figures, new births
and m arriages are reported to the ancestors. Offerings of food on the altars
serve to request the ancestors' help in times of illness or misfortune. From Nias
in the west to Sumba and the Moluccas in the east, large megalithic stones serve
as altars or monuments to the ancestors. Their central position in the villages'
public spaces reflects the centrality of ancestors in everyday life.
In addition to providing protection, the deceased ancestors serve as sources
of advice, inspiration, and information about magical or other esoteric knowl-
edge. Images and motifs used in art can either be passed down from ancestors
to an individual through the line of descendants or communicated directly by
ancestor spirits- for example, in dreams. Among the Iban of Borneo, dreams
are the vehicle by which spirits, including ancestral spirits, communicate with
the living. Iban weavers who are old enough and strong enough to weave the
most sacred Iban textile, known as the pua (see figure 4), have a dream in
which Kumang, a deity who taught the Iban how to weave and dye, teaches
them a new design and even an individual honorific or "praise name" uniquely
given to that design. One of the functions of the pua cloth is to induce com-
munication with ancestors-through dreams- in those who sleep wrapped in

11
Figure 4. Ceremonial textile (pua),
Iban ("Dayak"), northern Borneo.
Cotton, 247 x 108.3 em. Among the
Iban, dreams are the vehicle by which
spirits communicate with the living.
In dreams, spirits communicate the
designs for the pua cloth to weavers.
After it is woven, one of the cloth's
functions is to induce communica-
tion with ancestors-through
dream s-in those who sleep wrapped
in it. In such cases, objects are not
themselves exchanged, but the "ex-
change" is necessary for the object's
production, and the object is neces-
sary for continuing the exchange.
(The University Museum, P-603a.
Photograph courtesy of The Univer-
sity Museum, University of Pennsyl-
vania {neg. no. T4- 124}.)

it (Heppel1994). In such cases, objects are not themselves exchanged, but the
"exchange" is necessary for the object's production, and the object is necessary
for continuing the exchange.

The Spirit World: Reciprocity and Rites of Passage

Another pervasive theme of Indonesian art is the relationship of persons to
spirits, each having reciprocal duties toward each other. The contact between
persons and ancestral or other spirits often takes place through the medium of
art. Similarly, visual and other arts are used to contact deities and to express
fundamental beliefs about the cosmos and man's place in it relative to spirits,
deities, plants, and animals.
Spirits and deities are not necessarily the same as ancestors (individual hu-
mans who have died), although there is overlap because some of the de-
ceased-especially important ancestors-can become deified spirits. Those
who die suddenly or violently, those who do not receive proper funeral cere-
monies, and women who die in childbirth can all become harmful spirits.
Sometimes an image that looks very much like an ancestor image is used as in-
termediary to a deity or spirit that was never a living human. For example, the
adu horo figures of central Nias Island (figure 5) are images of a generalized an-
cestor, not any particular known individual. Because moral norms were collec-
tively set down by ancestors in the distant past, offerings to atone for violations
are made to the adu horo image, perhaps as a representation of the collective
ancestors whose wrath enforces social norms and whose benevolence protects
society.
Indonesians call on the power of art at transitional times in the human life
cycle, during rites of passage such as birth, circumcision, marriage, various
stages of adulthood or accession to offices, and death. The power of objects rit-

12
 ually given during these critical transitions can be called upon and even in-
creased later. Many artworks functioned as gifts presented at times of transi-
tion, including the ceremonial tampan "ship cloths" (figure 6) used as wrappers
for gifts exchanged among families, or the large palepai cloths displayed by
noble families of Lampung (southern Sumatra) as banners hung at cere-
monies. Such cloths were used for births, tooth-filing ceremonies, engage-
ments, marriages, house-building feasts, and funerals.
Artworks were also commissioned to commemorate the feasts (opportuni-
ties for the display of generosity) that accompanied the celebration oflife tran-
sitions, such as the simple commoner's ancestor figure from the Maenamolo
region (South Nias) (figure 7), built to commemorate a community feast given
by the sponsor whose ancestor is depicted, in order to fulfill the sponsor's sta-
tus as an adult citizen. In short, life's critical transitions, or rites of passage,
were met with ritual or celebration, times in which visual art objects and gift
exchange have always played an important role.

Conclusion
The guardians of esoteric knowledge are the leaders of traditional Indone-
sian communities and the upholders of adat, or custom. The deep respect for
traditional ideas about reciprocal relations with ancestors, about marriage and

Figures. Figure for atonement (adu

hori:i ), Central Nias. Wood, 249 x
38.5 x 27-9 em. Because moral norms
were collectively set down by ances-
tors in the distant past, offerings to
atone for violations are made to the
adu hori:i image, perhaps as a repre-
sentation of the collective ancestors
whose wrath enforces social norms
and whose benevolence protects soci-
ety. (Museum Nasional Indonesia,
Jakarta, 23696. Photograph by Diane
Nordeck, Smithsonian Institution.)

Figure 6. Ceremonial cloth (tampan or "ship cloth"), Lampung, southern Suma-

tra. Cotton, 53 x 53·4 em. Many artworks functioned as gifts presented at times of
transition, including this ship cloth used as a wrapper for gifts exchanged among
fa milies in Lampung. (Museum Nasional Indonesia, Jakarta, 22241. Photograph
by Diane Nordeck, Smithsonian Institution.)

13
 Figure 1· Ancestor figure (adu), South
Nias. Wood, 56 x 36 x 7 em. Artworks
were commissioned also to commem-
orate the feasts (opportunities for the
display ofgenerosity) that accompa-
nied the celebration of life transi-
tions, such as this simple commoner's
ancestor figure from the Maenamolo
region (South Nias). This was built
to commemorate a community feast
given by the sponsor whose ancestor
is depicted, in order to fulfill the
sponsor's status as an adult citizen.
(Museum Nasional Indonesia,
Jakarta, 21419. Photograph by Diane
Nordeck, Smithsonian Institution.)

the reciprocities it entails, and about relationships with the spirit world are at
the heart of respect for custom that members of every outer-island society pro-
claim. Even more than its English translation "custom;' adat (and its equiva-
lents in other Indonesian languages) has an ethical and normative connota-
tion. Traditional respect for ancestors and ancestral ways is therefo re closely
linked to a thoroughgoing respect for reciprocity and mutual support in an in-
dividual's relationships with other people and with other inhabitants of the
natural and supernatural worlds. "Gifts;' broadly defined, are the currency and
the expression of that reciprocity and mutual support. As exemplified in this
exhibition, they include many of Indonesia's most important art forms.

Portio11s of this text describi11g objects i11 the exhibitio11, a11d all figures except figu res 1 a11d J, are take11
from the book accompanying the exhibitio11, Taylor a11d Aragon 1991.

14
 WEDDING GIFTS AND MARITAL ALLIANCES

A Tusk and a Set of Ornaments:
Exchange Goods in Lio Marriage
Alliance
Roy Hamilton
Figure 8. Bridewealth negotiations in
Wolotopo, 1988. The two men seated
to either side of the horse are the chief
negotiators for the two clans in-
volved. The horse itself is one of the
bridewealth items to be given by the
groom's kin to the bride's. (Photo-
graph by Roy Hamilton.)
The 140, 000 people of the Lio ethnic group constitute one of the most popu-
lous societies on the island of Flores, located in Indonesia's Lesser Sunda Is-
lands. Roy Hamilton has investigated textiles, exchange, and marriage alliance
in the Lio village of Wolotopo. The marriage he described in this presentation
is a relatively traditional one, but nevertheless influenced by the Roman
Catholic faith that now predominates in the village. As in our own culture,
there are many variant forms of weddings in Wolotopo, in part resulting from
outside influences to which the community has been subjected (contrary to
travel brochure descriptions that portray it as unchanged in centuries! ).
Weddings in this area were traditionally initiated in a formalized procedure
in which exchanges of gift items followed definite directional as well as con-
tent-based rules. To initiate the proceedings, the groom or his representatives
visited the bride's family on four consecutive nights, thus signalling an intent to
negotiate a marriage. If the proposal to negotiate was accepted, the bride's fam-
ily notified the groom's kin, and the next morning the necessary ingredients for
the engagement feast were assembled according to formal procedural rules.
The bride's family contributed rice, while the groom's family provided meat
and moke, an alcoholic beverage distilled from palm sap. The feast formalized
the couple's engagement.
During the one to three years of the standard Lio engagement, the groom's
family marshalled its resources to meet the expected bridewealth payments. On
the day of negotiation (see figure 8), the head of the bride's clan, the man re-
sponsible for the distribution of land use rights, called his kinsman to provide

are at
rpro-
[UJVa-
nota-
losely
min-
)f the
yand
1 this

etaken

15
rice, yams, and bananas, the produce of the land over which he had authority,
in order to negotiate with the family of the groom. These products when
brought to the groom's family were reciprocated by an exchange of pigs, sent
from the groom's home to the bride's home.
The payments discussed were in the form of gold and silver ornaments, live-
stock, and cash. In the past a formalized ritual language was used to refer to the
equally formalized objects of bridewealth. In this area two terms were used.
One, setoko seliwu, referred to a tusk of ivory and two pair of gold ornaments,
while seeko seliwu was the term for livestock and four gold ornaments. Al-
though precise terms described these items, the actual value of individual se-
toko seliwu and seeko seliwu varied from case to case. Contemporary payments,
however, generally comprised ornaments, livestock, and cash, for ivory had
gone out of circulation in the Lio area.
An extensive process, negotiations began around the exchange of orna-
ments. Typically gold and silver ornaments become the property of the bride's
clan under guardianship of the headman. They would become available to
other clan members required to pay bridewealth necessary for a son of the clan
to marry. In this instance, the groom's kin offered a seventeen-gram set of gold
ornaments plus a smaller silver set, while the bride's kin requested the more
standard twenty-gram set. Claiming that they did not own such a set, the
groom's family offered to add a small eight-gram group to make up the differ-
ence.
Next, the negotiators discussed the provisioning of the wedding feast and
the payments to the individual kinsmen of the bride's clan known as mbuku.
While theoretically each paternal uncle in the bride's clan was owed a tusk and
ornaments or livestock and ornaments as his mbuku payment, in current prac-
tice the payments consisted primarily of livestock and cash. In this specific sit-
uation, a cow was initially offered by the groom's kin as feast provision, only to
be met with protestations from the bride's kin that the cow was all bones, that
meat was needed to be taken to people back home who could not attend the
wedding feast and therefore the addition of a pig was required. The groom's
family agreed in principle but requested that they be permitted to bring the pig
on the wedding day. The bride's clan accepted these terms and immediately
provided a cow, a horse, and a pig to be applied to the mbuku payments.
The official bridewealth negotiations completed, a return contribution of
textiles to the groom's kin was assembled at the home of the bride. Since thir-
teen male relatives of the groom were each entitled to a contribution, thirteen
of the bride's kin contributed textiles to be exchanged on an individual-to-
individual basis with the groom's kin. After carrying the textiles to the groom's
home, the bride's kinswomen were presented with betel. They then presented
the textiles to the groom's kinswomen, receiving cash in return. Although cash
was received by the bride's kinswomen, the payment did not equal the valu~ of
the textiles themselves.
Finally, after the actual wedding, which took place in a Catholic church,
officiated by a Spanish priest, another exchange occurred in which the bride's
family provided textiles to the family of the groom and equipped the house-
hold of the bridal couple. The surplus from this exchange was redistributed by
the couple according to the rule that textiles could not be returned to bride-
giving kin, but would pass only to relatives in the bride-receiving category.
Hamilton used this detailed example to illustrate salient principles of Lio
marriage exchange. He stated that although the term bride price is sometimes

16
 used in the description of these proceedings, more than economic issues must
thority, be satisfied in these exchanges. Despite hard bargaining and a quantitative in-
s when terest in the nature of these goods (which we might consider economic), to the
gs, sent Lio these practices comprised a series of social exchanges between kin.
One of the most important principles in this social exchange system re-
1ts, live- volved around the notion of delayed payment. Much of the general negotiation
r to the determined which obligations would be paid immediately and which could be
·e used. postponed indefinitely. The amount negotiated for immediate payment was
1ments, never enough to provide for all of the relatives eligible to make claims. Of the
n.ts. Al- thirteen paternal uncles of the bride who contributed textiles to the groom's
iual se- kin, not a single one received a full mbuku. All these men would at some later
rments, date, perhaps when arranging the marriage of a son, be able to call on the un-
Jry had paid debts stemming from this particular wedding to aid them in meeting fu-
ture obligations. Rather than a one-time exchange completed before the mar-
f orna- riage takes place, marriage instituted an ongoing series of exchanges between
bride's two sets of kin (see figure 9). This exchange relationship encompassed even
able to death, for a man's wife's family provided rice and cloth for his funeral, while
he clan the family of his sister's husband provided meat and moke.
of gold In personal terms this meant that a successful individual in Lio society must
e more be adept at manipulating the schemes of exchange. The hope would be that an
set, the individual, in a series of transactions that kept goods moving from family to
:differ- family, would realize the same quantity of goods as had initially been held. On
the one side, a man would be giving gold and taking in textiles, while on the
ast and other side he would be taking in gold and giving textiles. Obligations continu-
mbuku. ally incurred, delayed, and met would lead to balance.
1sk and
1t prac- Discussion
:ific sit- Queried about the use of a mental record for tracking obligations and the
only to possibility of conflict that might arise if parties recalled events and exchanges
es, that differently, Roy Hamilton discussed the political nature of this exchange
~nd the process. Essentially if claims can be asserted powerfully and convincingly, they
:room's are more likely to be honored than not. While certain obligations must be met
the pig in theory, what actually gets paid is political. In this system any individual can
~diately always think of some debt that requires payment. If it is tendered weakly or by
a less-than-powerful individual, however, the claim may be brushed aside.
tion of Responding to a question about complementarity between wife givers and
ce thir- wife takers, Hamilton elaborated upon the value of the bride. He stated that it
hirteen was a theoretical issue whether to include the bride as a good that is moving or
to- not. No one in Lio would ever attribute a value to the bride, so that is why these
;room's exchanges were considered social rather than economic. The only value to the
~sen ted bride is that each relative would be entitled to receive the theoretical tusk and
sh cash ornaments or some other payment. The bride is not considered an economic
·alue of purchase.
In answer to questions concerning evaluations of livestock and quality of
:hurch, craftsmanship, Hamilton replied that the value of livestock was definitely cal-
bride's culated, with pigs worth more than cows, since it is generally believed that pigs
house- provide the most meat. Size too contributes to value. Good workmanship, es-
lted by pecially in the weaving of textiles, is prized. Kin would be proud to provide
bride- well-made sarongs dyed with natural dyes as opposed to those dyed with
ry. chemical dyes. Gold ornaments are valued by weight and shape, while ivory
of Lio tusks have become inalienable clan heirlooms. Gold might be sold outside of
1etimes

17
Figure 9· Exchanges between kin groups allied in marriage continue over the
years. Here kin of a bride carry rice and other goods to the home of the groom's
family as a return gift for bridewealth items presented two years earlier at the
time of the wedding. (Photograp h by Roy Hamilton.)

the ceremony only if the family were pressed by extraordinary economic cir-
cumstances. Textiles, on the other hand, had always been of social and eco-
nomic significance within the barter system with the coast.
Concerning a complete breakdown or failure of bride price negotiation,
Hamilton indicated that m uch ambivalence was associated with these negotia-
tions, yet everyone seemed to know beforehand what the result would be. He
was told that currently no wedding would ever be called off due to a failure to
agree. Postponement might occur. If the bride should die before producing off-
spring, however, this would certainly affect the claims made on the event. It is
readily acknowledged, both formally and in the literature, that what was actu-
ally being negotiated was the reproductive potential of the bride.

18
 Cultural Resistance in New Mexico: In 1846, during the Mexican-American War, Brigadier General Stephen Watts
The Case of Las Entriegas de Novios Kearney and his army "bloodlessly conquered" the territory we now know as
New Mexico. Despite a number of rebellions in the northern part of New Mex-
Maria Montoya ico, the predominantly Hispano and Native American population slowly came
under the control of the military government. As part of the Compromise of
1850, New Mexico became a territory and was governed by an Anglo- <.lami-
nated civilian territorial system that had its center three thousand miles to the
east in Washington, D.C. These two areas of the continent seemed to have little
in common. As Anglos from the East, many of whom harbored deep prejudices
against the native New Mexicans, poured into the territory, popular sentiment
assumed that the inhabitants of the isolated rural villages of northern New
Mexico all practiced Catholicism and were under the complete domination of
the Catholic Church as administered from the Diocese of Durango, Mexico.
The Catholicism that these Americans saw, however, was not a religion
founded upon the hegemonic control of the Catholic Church over local priests
and communities. Rather, it was a "folk" Catholicism created out of the vac-
uum of actual church control that distressed the newly appointed French Arch-
bishop Jean Baptiste Lamy with its seeming lack of order, hierarchy, and
sufficient clergy. Because of the territory's isolation from the Catholic Church's
administrators in Durango, Mexico, New Mexicans of this region had created a
"folk" Catholicism that met the needs of the pious in the absence of qualified
clergy. It was within this nonhegemonic Catholic tradition that extraclerical
groups like the Penitente Brotherhood and ceremonies like Las Entriegas de
Novios (a ceremony to sanction a marriage) emerged.
In 1850, when the New Mexican Territory was shifted so that the inhabitants
had to answer to the authority and administration of the French-influenced
Catholic Church at the Archdiocese of Saint Louis, Missouri, foreign priests
like Archbishop Lamy were pitted against local Spanish priests. The Hispano
inhabitants of the territory saw the new French priests as a threat to their com-
munities and their conception of religion. As Lamy tried to force the Penitentes
to disband and stop extraclerical ceremonies like Las Entriegas, the Hispano
communities refused.
The story becomes even more complex than a simple competition between
hegemonic and folk Catholicism when the diversity of the territory's religious
interests is considered. Protestant missionaries and a population of converso
Jews, who had slowly made their way to the farthest northern outpost of the
Spanish Empire after expulsion from Spain, further complicated the religious
struggles of the inhabitants of this region. Northern New Mexico proved to be
not the culturally and religiously homogenous culture of earlier historical and
anthropological reports, but a diverse community under siege. Pressure from
ic cir- foreign Catholicism, Protestant missionaries, and a hidden Judaic past all bore
~ eco- down upon the closely knit familial communities of the region. Amidst this re-
ligious conflict, the inhabitants sought a communal form of recognizing mar-
ation, riage, one that superseded religious particulars. It is within this context of reli-
gotia- gious strife that Las Entriegas de Novios can be characterized as an extraclerical
>e. He means of blessing a marriage by the community.
ure to The courtship process in these Hispano communities, until the modern era,
g off- when couples were permitted to choose their own mates, supported arranged
t. It is marriages as the norm. When a young m an wished to marry, his parents wrote
actu- a ceremonious letter to the bride's family, requesting her hand in marriage. The

19
messenger of the groom would wait at the bride's home to see if the girl and
her parents would accept the offer. In most cases the messenger ·would be sent
back with a reply that honored the wishes of the daughter (ni na), indicating
that a prospective bride's wishes were equal or at the very least seriously con-
sidered by the family.
Next the padrinos (godparents or sponsors of the couple) were sent for by
the bride's family, and the matter was discussed further. If the union was disap-
proved at this point, a letter of refusal, or "Dando calabazas," literally "giving
the squash" to the desires of the young man, would be sent within three to four
days. If the suitor was accepted, delicacy required a longer time to elapse before
sending an acceptance. After the acceptance letter was sent, a prendorio, or en-
gagement party, would be arranged to occur at the bride's home within two
weeks.
On the day of the prendorio, the groom, his family, and their entourage
would be ceremoniously received by the bride's family. They would then make
a formal request to see the bride. The bride would enter and be ceremoniously
presented to the groom's family by her prospective father-in-law, while the
groom would be introduced to the bride's family. The couple would then be
blessed to be recognized as prendados (officially engaged). Then they would ex-
change engagement presents. The bride would give the groom a token, such as
a rosary, while the groom's family would be expected to give Ia dona, or what
we call today a hope chest. La dona was filled with the bride's wedding outfit,
embroidered shawls, combs, and other items that had been handmade by the
female members of the groom's family. Finally wine and bizcochitos (traditional
cookies) were brought out, and the celebration commenced. For the next week,
the time preceding the marriage, the groom's family was responsible for enter-
taining and feasting the bride's family within the bride's community.
The wedding itself might be officiated by a priest if one were available and
affordable. After the formal religious ceremony, the families would return to
the bride's home to celebrate. Food and drink would be provided for the whole
community and a band commissioned to play into the night. In poor families
each member of the celebration might pay a dollar to dance with the bride or
groom, or pin money to the bride's gown in order to help the young couple
start their own home. At some time in the middle of the celebration, the group
would be called together, and the entregador would begin the five-stage Las En-
triegas de Novios.
Reference to the sample Las Entriegas text highlights the communal charac-
ter and the extraclerical nature of this form of marriage affirmation. In the first
section, La Invocacion, the entregador establishes the religious and communal
authority necessary to perform the affirmation through the use of secular, nat-
ural, and religious imagery.

Ave Maria! said the bird In the name of God

Before beginning to fly, And of the Virgin Mary
Ave Maria! I say To give over these Newlyweds
Before beginning to sing. With pleasure and happiness.

The second stage, or Los Versos de Ia Santa Escritura (verses from Holy
Scripture), provides examples of biblical models for marriage. While the His-
panos of the Upper Rio Grande were accustomed to the Franciscan priests' em-
phasis upon Mary and Joseph as familial role models, the new French priests
introduced Old Testament models. The residents of the northern sector of the

20
 territory may have found Adam and Eve foreign, but these verses indicate they
girl and
incorporated these teachings into their secular ceremony.
l be sent
dicating God made Adam sleep To begin as a married couple
sly con- In a beautiful garden, You should try to have faith
Giving him as a companion Always look to the example
tt for by A compassionate woman. Of Jesus, Mary, and Joseph.
ts disap- Adam awoke from his sleep
. "giving
With an admirable voice,
! to four
"I receive you as my wife to
e before
obey the Lord."
J, or en-

hin two The third stage, Los Versos de la Iglesia (verses from the Church), reports the
wedding itself. This is necessary to help the guests who had not attended the
tourage ceremony to know what had transpired. It also highlights the role of the cere-
!n make mony in publicly recognizing and sanctioning a couple in the absence of a
fniously priest.
bile the
The bride entered first The priest with his manual
then be With her beloved father, Explains to them very legally
mld ex-
Who takes her by hand "I give you the dowry coins
such as
To give her to her husband. and the pastoral ring."
or what
g outfit, The priest asked them Four doves in flight
! by the "If you want to marry say so" Came out of the church
tlitional And the church heard them The godfather and godmother
ctweek, Both say "yes." The husband and his princess.
renter- In the fourth stage, Consejos o Parabienes (advice), the entregador recovers
his own voice and offers advice that stands in opposition to the more legal or
ble and abstract advice offered by the priest and referred to in the third stage. The con-
turn to sejos are often humorous and explicit but always practical. The entregador
ewhole points out that a wedding changes all past relationships and begins new ones
'amilies for all concerned.
lride or
couple Hear what I am telling you Don't think you're so great,
Now everything will change. I only want to frighten you.
No longer will you have parents so-so is the contract
So you can spoil yourself. And both should cooperate.
charac- The last stage, or Los Versos de la Gente (verses for th e people), honors the
llie first padrinos (godparents), compadres (parents-in-law), and other family members
tmunal and friends present at the celebration. An improvised verse, based upon the
ar, nat- play of sounds in a person's name, set formulae, and individual qualities of the
couple's friend or relative, memorializes the participation of the individual in
this event. When the entregador completes this final section, all again file by the
newlyweds to wish them luck and m any children.

Also to Facundo Martinez The bride's aunt and uncle

Greetings and a little caress, I do not want to forget
Long live his lovely wife Mike and Lorena Gonzales
Holy And everyone from El Rito. God is sure to keep th em .
1e His- Las Entriegas de Novios was a community affirmation of marriage and re-
ts' em- vealed the importance of this step in both the newlyweds' and the community's
priests life. While it was probably born out of the necessity to improvise in the face of
of the
21

Bride's Wealth: A Woloma
and the Invention of a Tradition
Mary fo Arnoldi
corrupt and scarce clergy, Las Entriegas de Novios eventually became a ritual-
ized form of resistance to clergy and an affirmation of the strength of family
and community. Even today, in northern New Mexican towns and the urban
centers of Denver and Albuquerque, Las Entriegas de Novios continues to be a
part of the wedding celebration. The persistence of culture and familial values
in the face of the debilitating effects of mobility and urbanization must be ap-
plauded and encouraged by those who wish to see traditional customs thrive.
Discussion
Maria Montoya responded to a series of questions about the bride and the
hope chest. She indicated that the items comprising this gift would be tradi-
tional, made from white linen and relatively simple. For the entire week before
the wedding, the bride would go through a series of fittings for these garments.
Whatever the female members of the groom's family felt was appropriate
would be part of the gift. It was a gift that the bride always accepted and never
deemed unacceptable.
Questioned about who arranges for the entregador, she replied that this, like
everything else that occurred on the wedding day, was controlled by the
groom's family. The bride's family, however, chose the godparents, or sponsors
of the marriage, who would serve as counselors to the newlyweds and advise
them.
In response to a question concerning the retention of this ceremony in cur-
rent times, she stated that the ceremony persists today, even in urban weddings,
although the musical instruments used may be electric guitars and drums. Las
Entriegas, an adaptive form, remains as a communal affirmation of m arriage.
Mary Jo Arnoldi began her discussion of a post-World War II Bamana women's
exchange ceremony known as the woloma with a caveat warning against con-
sidering this localized, invented tradition as representative of the actions of
women in the entire Bamana cultural region in Mali. Citing the work of Maria
Grosz-Ngate on Bamana kinship, marriage, and the ceremony of the woloma
itself, she affirmed that even in the contemporary period, Bamana marriage re-
mains one of the most important social arenas in which external forces con-
tributing to social transformations are internalized and mediated through
symbolic means. Sh ifting attention from the jural dimensions of marriage in
the exchange of bride wealth among m en, to bride's wealth, literally the wed-
ding goods, Arnoldi explored women's roles in the generation of interhouse-
hold relationships. The ritualized practice of exchanging textiles during the
woloma, a ceremony occurring on a bride's wedding day and organized exclu-
sively for and by women, symbolically encoded the practice of creating rela-
tionships that ameliorated differences between individuals in the face of a
changing economy that encouraged divisive social t ransformations.
Arnoldi then described the particulars of the woloma ceremony as she had
observed it in 1979 and as Grosz-Ngate has written of it. Traditionally the cere-
mony takes place in the groom's village, and the bride does not participate her-
self. Rather, her mother and female kinswomen represent her. No divorced
women or divorced and remarried women may participate, but they, like all the
other women of the village, may observe the proceedings.
First the wedding goods are publicly displayed and sorted so that all the
housewares and other domestic goods that will become the personal property
22
 of the bride are visible and set aside for her. Then the blankets and tunic to be
1 ritual- given to a groom's kinsman in trust for his use are displayed and reserved. Fi-
f family nally calabashes, enamel bowls, and textiles are displayed and sorted, while the
e urban women watch, comment, and pass judgment upon the quality and quantity of
; to be a the items displayed. Then the cotton textiles, usually numbering between one
tl values hundred and two hundred pieces, and the enamel and calabash containers,
;t be ap- generally more than sixty of them, are distributed by the kinswomen of the
thrive. bride to the kinswomen of the groom. At the close of the ceremony a special
presentation known as the tithe, consisting of about fifteen to thirty textiles
and set aside by the bride's mother, is offered to the sister of the groom. (See
and the figures 10 and n.)
1e tradi-
k before
trments.
ropriate
td never

this, like
by the
ponsors
d advise

r in cur-
~ddings ,
1ms. Las
rnage.

¥omen's
nst con-
tions of
)fMaria Figure 10. Contemporary handwoven According to Arnoldi, several sets of relationships are implicated by woloma
woloma cotton textile from Mali. These hand- gift exchange. The first involves the relationship between the bride, her mother,
riage re- woven cotton blankets, constructed of and their network of kinswomen and friends. The second set of relationships
ces con- seven individually woven strips, are constructed through the exchange includes those between the bride and her
through produced in the northern region of husband's kinswomen and household female residents. A third set of relation-
Tiage in Timbuctou. In the central region of ships symbolically evoked in the woloma implicates lineage. This link ensures
he wed- Segou, the Timbuctou blankets are future marriage exchanges along so-called Bamana kinroads or balima sira, es-
:rhouse- highly desirable and regularly part of tablished through the alliance of bride and groom.
ring the marriage-good exchanges. (Lamb Like other African societies, Bam ana society has undergone rapid changes,
d exclu- Collection [17M}; Collection of the especially in the past fifty years, as rural communities become more thoroughly
ng rela- National Museum ofAfrican Art and integrated in commodity markets and cash economies. Citing Maria Grosz-
lce of a the National Museum of Natural Ngate, Arnoldi stated that at the historical moment when integration in the
History, Smithsonian Institution.) market economy helped escalate the range and quantity of wedding goods that
she had brides claimed as their wealth, the woloma ceremony was invented. Bridal
he cere- goods that once, at least around the area of Segou, comprised a modest num-
late her- ber of handwoven textiles, thirty pieces indicating wealth in 193 0, and tradi-
iivorced tional domestic goods such as a mortar an d pestle, an axe, pottery, and cal-
~e all the
abashes now had increased and changed in character. Between one hundred
and two hundred textiles were currently required, both handwoven and indus-
t all the
trially produced, as well as kerosene, chairs, metal furnishings, tea sets and bra-
'roperty

23
Figure 11. Masquerade costum e from Mali. The majority of cotton cloths exchanged as part of the bride's wealth during the
woloma ceremony are of the type and size pictured here as part of a masquerade costume. Most of these handwoven cloths are
now made with machine-spun and industrially dyed cotton threads. The cloths are now multicolored, and the width and pat-
in
tern of stripes vary widely. Women the community generally will lend the young m en's association some of their accumu-
lated textiles to be used for temporary costumes in the annual masquerade performances. (Photograph by Lynn Forsdale.)

ziers, and other items associated with urban culture and modernity. This esca-
lation of wedding goods has put increased pressure on the mother of the bride.
Her good name, that is, her identification by her own kin as well as the groom's
family as an industrious and upright woman, rests upon the quantity and qual-
ity of her daughter's wedding gifts.
While generally the case that mutual aid in labor and provisioning among
households has decreased as people become further integrated into a cash
economy, mutual aid and reciprocity among Bamana women, the ones respon-
sible for collecting a daughter's bride wealth, has increased. A creative system to
provide for a daughter's woloma ceremony involves participation in textile ex-
change among women. Through this system of exchange, well-placed gifts of
textiles to kinswomen and friends as they prepare for their daughters' weddings
ensures a woman's success in accumulating wedding goods for her own daugh-
ter. It is in this system that women, independent of men, activate their kin rela-
tionships, for a gift of cloth obligates the recipient to reciprocate in kind at a
later date.
The practice of distributing cloth enhanced by bowls to the women of the
groom's household underscores the women's mutuality. This custom empha-
sizes that the bride recognizes the importance that each of these women will
play in her new life and in the life of her children. As a new bride, the most ju-
nior member in a new hierarchy of women, she is expected to submit to their
authority in household matters. Her successful integration into her new hus-

24
 band's household is encouraged by the ritualized public redistribution of her
bride's wealth among these women. Through the ceremony, Bamana women
ameliorate, if only for a time, the divisive nature of the transforming economy
in portraying each individual's differing access to wealth. Within the woloma,
the bride's generosity, achieved through the effort of her mother and
kinswomen, is publicly praised as representing a wife who respects both her
husband and his kin and who seeks to maintain harmonious relationships
among the women of her new household.
Arnoldi posed a final question: Why cloth? She answered that, as a gendered
object, cloth symbolizes the transformation of a young girl into a woman/wife.
The term for an unmarried girl is npogotigi, owner of the cash-sexe, while the
term for a married woman is fini muso, a wife or woman of cloth. Since women
have always been the primary producers of handspun cotton thread, their par-
ticipation in forging these alliances attests to their continued investment in
cloth's potency to join lineages even in a period of momentous change.

Discussion
Questions during the discussion period centered largely upon the cash
value associated with cloth. In answering these questions, Mary Jo Arnoldi
elaborated upon the position of women in Bamana economies. She stated that
since women have no access to lineage, grain, or property in this society,
women have for a long time participated in systems of small capital invest-
ments. In fact, women celebrate cash transfer in another ritual during a cere-
mony known as the masquerade. Cloth very definitely possesses a market
value. If a woman requires cash, then textiles are circulated or sold off to pro-
vide it. In this invented tradition of the woloma, women's gender interests are
served. In an increasingly commodified world, there is talk and shame among
women about poverty. A woman who lives as a third wife, in a household
where she does not have the same access to goods as other wives, benefits from
a reinvention of a distribution system. Woloma does not create or support a hi-
erarchy among women.
Discussing the cloth itself, Arnoldi told of changes in textile production that
require increased amounts of cash to accumulate textiles. Where once women
had spun the thread and men wove the thread into cloth, young men in the
household, because of their increasing migration to the cities and involvement
in nontraditional work, no longer provide cloth for the women. This means
that more industrially produced cloth than before circulates through cash ex-
changes. In the exchanges that occur around a wedding, cloth travels in both
directions, bride to groom and groom to bride. This is a relatively new practice,
established in the 1950s. The groom's family, for example, provides the veil, a
cloth that covers the bride completely. This cloth is then kept by the bride's
family, probably to be used again.

Southern Ceremonial Gifts Candace Waid began her discussion of Southern ceremonial gifts by describing
Southern weddings as recalled and created by Katherine Anne Porter. In these
of the Candace Waid recollections and stories it was not unusual for slave-holding elites to provide
~mpha­ the bride with a gift of a house servant: a literally "thoughtful" gift designed to
ten will make the bride's new place feel like home. By comparison, slave weddings in
!lOStju- the antebellum South might incorporate special foods and elaborate costumes,
to their and commemorate a profound rite of human joining if the man and woman
~w hus-

25
had chosen each other, but they also signalled something else. While slave wed-
dings were important as rituals of cohesion in an ominously stratified world,
they also served as public enactments of the antebellum ideal of a plantation
family, white and black, and therefore were designed to increase slaves' loyalty
to their masters. At the same time these rites gave form to the slaves' hopes that,
faced with a choice, the master might honor their bonds of matrimony over his
rights of bondage.
If the definition of property in human bondage gives a disconcerting mean-
ing to the idea of the gift that keeps on giving, then the concept of a "gift of
self" might also prove disconcerting. Even for those who reject the tradition
which requires that a father give the bride away, marriage by definition insists
that a problematic exchange take place. Because of this problematic exchange
at the center of a wedding, it becomes clear that weddings, whether in literature
or in life, are not easily enacted. Wedding gifts, gifts of self, objects which are
meant to represent the less tangible and more problematic exchange that ac-
complishes the wedding of two individuals, are found throughout Southern
literature. One of the most precise statements about the meaning of wedding
gifts in the conflicts surrounding weddings is found in an unsettling work of
fiction characterized as grotesque, Carson McCullers's Ballad of the Sad Cafe.
As Waid recounted the novel, she suggested that the difficulties of love in
this work were embodied in the giving of gifts. One of the narratives within the
novel tells of an unsuccessful marriage in which the husband cannot bring his
wife to bed. In his efforts to woo his wife, the character, Marvin Macy, gives her
all his possessions. Among them are a bracelet with two silver hearts, a box of
candy, a watch case, and two acres of land. His wife, Miss Amelia, known for
her financial shrewdness, looks over the offerings and marks them for sale in
her store, thereby reducing the heart-shaped gifts that represented the body
and love to material objects. Macy, because of his origins as an orphan and
temporarily reformed criminal, has no gift, no object of intangible meaning, to
give her to thwart her compulsion to reduce his gifts to monetary terms.
When Miss Amelia begins to give gifts which represent her love to the
hunchback who arrives in town claiming to be her cousin, she gives him the
things she values most, and then she gives him everything. Among her offer-
ings to cousin Lymon is a large acorn picked up on the day her father died, and
a blue enamel snuff box that belonged to her father. The tie established
through this exchange is familial and crosses over into the past to link the living
with the dead. The tie between them grows more visceral as Miss Amelia gives
Lymon chicken : "the breast, the liver and the heart." Miss Amelia's visceral of-
ferings are not limited to associations between parts of women and pieces of
chickens. She literalizes her desire to give herself to cousin Lymon by giving
him her kidney stones set as ornaments in a watch chain. She values the stones
and this gift so highly because they were purchased through so much pain.
Waid continued by stating that The Ballad of the Sad Cafe, while not known
for its optimistic view of human relations, does offer an analysis of the problem
of gifts given in the hope of joining one's self to another. In McCullers's para-
digm the lover attempts to give something to the beloved, craving "any possible
relation with the beloved, even if this experience can cause only pain." The
same lover, the giver of gifts, desires to strip the beloved bare. Paradoxically the
giving of gifts becomes part of this process. The beloved is stripped bare by
having his or her interior thoughts and objects of desire displaced by the ob-
jects which stand for the lover's self.

26
 The long-delayed consummation of the initial wedding takes place when
Miss Amelia's estranged husband becomes the focus of cousin Lymon's desire.
After cousin Lymon assumes the role of the lover and offers Macy Miss
Amelia's bed to sleep in, a place to which as her husband he was denied access,
he accomplishes the intangible exchange which enacts a wedding. He gives
Marvin Macy what he most wants, Miss Amelia, although their long-delayed
joining occurs in the form of a vicious erotically charged wrestling match.
In this love triangle the gifts become increasingly personal: from silver
hearts to kidney stones, from part of the woman to the whole. These objects of
joining offered the illusion of blood ties, but the human condition as described
in this work is dominated by isolation. As the final image of men working to-
gether on a chain gang illustrates, men are held together by chains and bonded
by bondage. Weddings are not effected through a simple ceremony, b ut rather
seem to call for other rituals, typically blood rituals, that are consecrated
through the giving of gifts.
In Eudora Welty's Delta Wedding, another Southern marriage conflict is ex-
plored. The bride and groom in Southern fiction and Southern life must an-
swer to both mate and family clan. Marriage is again problematic in that it un-
derlines conflicts in familial loyalties, particularly between the husband and the
mother of the bride. This conflict is acknowledged in the novel when the char-
acter Robbie Reid, having left her husband George over her anger at the ques-
tion whom he loves best, her or his family, shouts in exasperation, "I didn't
marry into them! I married George."
The most important wedding presents in Delta Wedding are those which
seem to extend the circulation of gifts and the relationships those gifts repre-
sent to other members of the family in hopes of joining together more than the
bride and groom. To mend the rift between Robbie Reid and her husband
George, the ancient nurse Partheny makes a cake containing the heart and
blood of a white dove together with snake blood. After giving instructions
about the ritual of eating it, Partheny promises that it will reunite George and
Robbie. However, Partheny's blood cake made for George inadvertently be-
comes a wedding gift to a couple about to be married. The mistaken recipient,
the groom, then offers the cake to Robbie Reid, who in turn gives the cake to an
unmarried black woman, Pinchy. All three eaters of the cake are outsiders. The
husband-to-be, George's estranged wife, and Pinchy are all divided from the
old Delta family to whom they are supposed to be joined.
The necessity of blood cake suggests the difficulty of marriage in times of
social change. Like bride's cake, blood cake is a traditional cake that in slavery
times and afterward called lost lovers across distances. Blood cake is a cake for
married people, but its goal is wedding those married people and bringing
them together. Such cakes and ritualistic charms were important for slaves
whose mates and families had been rended from them by a system of property
that made a mockery of marriage.
Waid closed by stating that the exchanges in The Ballad of the Sad Cafe sug-
gest the dangers of personal gifts, direct offerings of the body. These gifts, like
the intangible expectations of exchange in weddings, expect too much. They
are demanding gifts, meant to effect transformations, in the hope that they will
conjure blood ties among family members where they are lacking- namely,
between husbands and wives. Blood cake, a powerful emblem of communion,
stands for the hope of an actual blood tie, literalized in the form of a child, to
embody the relationship between husband and wife.

27
 Discussion
In the discussion period, Candace Waid, questioned about the reliability of
literary evidence versus "anthropological" evidence, replied that it was in fact
the same thing, and some would say even better. She discussed the distinctive-
ness of Southern literature, fo unded on illiteracy in both the black and white
population, an illiteracy that promoted deep and lasting traditions of oral nar-
rative that form the basis for Southern story and literature.
Queried about other gifts given at Southern weddings, Waid discussed the
importance of the narrative constructed around the gift. Claiming that South-
erners are narratively sophisticated and that they often understand every part
of their lives through story, she suggested that wedding gifts are not merely
things, but objects that m ust be read. Offering local examples from her own
community in the Appalachian foothills of northern Alabama, she discussed in
some detail the gift of a bag of rags given by the bride's family to the newly
married couple. While the groom was insulted, feeling that the bride's family
was saying rags were all he would ever be able to give her, years later it became
apparent to both husband and wife that this was the most useful gift that they
had received. This gift, which continues to be talked about, tells a story not only
about family poverty and the significance of the work ethic, but also about gifts
that represent the familial tensions and mysteries that are a part of marriage.
Asked about the presentation of heirlooms as gifts, Waid recalled that both
brides and grooms often carry or wear some important ancestral emblem
which they have been given, like a piece of old jewelry or a family watch. These
heirlooms are given to the bride and groom by their respective families. The
most common ancestral gift, which passes from the groom's family to the
bride, is the mother's or grandmother's wedding ring. In other instances, the
paternal grandmother may give something to her granddaughter to wear in her
wedding that would not have been entrusted to her mother (who would have
been a relative outsider to the family a l the time of the earlier marriage) . When
heirlooms are given to in-laws, it is often with the understanding that they will
eventually be passed on to particular children. Heirlooms both represent and
enact a cycle of continuity and replacement.
Much discussion occurred around the idea of returning gifts to original
donors. Waid suggested that it did not happen frequently, for there would be
too much of a story associated with it. The only reason to ask for the return of
a gift would be to create a story about you, the original donor, a story that
would emphasize and commemorate the giver's disgust for the married couple
or for one of the parties after a divorce. It was suggested that while the model of
gift giving is reversible, in practice most people see it as an irreversible forward
motion. Returning a gift, even an heirloom, would be a tremendous breach of
practice. If a gift is returned, then there is a clear indication that there was a
contract. That's why a gift cannot be given back, for it gives the lie to the situa-
tion. But it is this ambiguity and characteristic anxiety associated with gift giv-
ing that may be exploited by the parties concerned.

28
ability of GIFTS IN ECONOMIC PERSPECTIVE
as in fact
;tinctive- Gift or Loan: Kapauku Papuan Money Leopold Pospisil prefaced his presentation on Kapauku exchange by stating
nd white Transactions and Their Economic that he did original quantitative research in the Papua New Guinea highlands
oral nar- and Political Significance during the years 1964 and 1965. He was the first white man to inhabit a remote
highland region and managed to keep the Dutch government from interfering
Leopold Pospisil in the area until his research was finished.
In contrast to anthropologists who claimed that many of the indigenous
people of Papua New Guinea support an essentially egalitarian or collectivist
society, Pospisil maintained the contrary, stating that the Kapauku were fantas-
tically individualistic. There was no such notion as collective ownership in this
society. Rather everything was individualized to the extent that bridges,
drainage ditches, even primary virgin rain forest was separated and segmented
according to individual ownership principles.
Again contrary to other anthropological studies of indigenous populations,
Pospisil asserted that he observed the workings of a real monetary system
among the Kapauku. Using cowrie shells and beads as currency, village resi-
dents employed this true money to buy land, services, and a range of other
products like relief from mourning pain at a burial. This money was a true and
universal means of determining value, and could be translated into dollars so
that the individual wealth of the inhabitants might be calculated and known by
researchers.
Pospisil also maintained that the Kapauku economy was a market economy.
Prices in the markets were determined and manipulated by supply and de-
mand, with many residents specializing as traders. It was an economy in which
the importance of wealth could not be underestimated. Profit always moti-
vated the Kapauku. In this society, great wealth cleared the path to economic,
political, and judicial authority.
Turning to gift, Pospisil stated that in Kapauku society gift was legally not
dissimilar from loan. Most if not all gifts required repayment, but the obliga-
tion to repay was delayed rather than immediate. If, for example, one man's gift
to another man comprised the loan of money necessary to meet a bride price,
it would be a moral transgression for the donor to demand repayment the next
day, an action that would cause him a tremendous loss in prestige. It would be
morally and legally correct to request repayment only after the birth of a child.
Even better for the prestige of the donor would be the collection of the loan re-
payment at the marriage of the first child.
Loan and gift were also distinguished conceptually and realistically in this
society. Three categories of exchange comprise the gift-loan continuum. First is
the gift given with no expectation of return, next the gift provided as a loan,
and finally a straightforward loan. Money and pork might be loaned or given,
as could the rights to usage and the cultivation of a plot of land. Pigs, canoes,
bride price, and most land transactions, however, were not exchanged as gifts.
According to Pospisil, the gift or loan of pork was of the greatest importance
in the Kapauku economy. The exchange of pork functioned as a method of
food preservation. An individual might kill a few pigs to eat, consuming what
could be used by his family and distributing the rest throughout the commu-
nity. After finishing the pigs, the original loaner could then request that his
neighbors repay him in kind, thereby ensuring his family a steady supply of
fresh pork over an extended period of time. Salt too would be loaned and re-
paid in kind, providing steady access to yet another dietary staple.

29

Real Gifts: Treaties, Grants,
and Land Transfers in America
George Miles
Gen eral gifts of artifacts and gam e were exchanged am ong villagers and be-
tween villagers and outsiders. Artifacts too, such as necklaces, would be given
in exchange for services as well as in the frequent exchanges between best
friends. While it was legal to ask for a repaym ent from a best friend, this was
never done. Rather, repaym ent would be requested from the friend's heirs at
th e time of his death.
Pospisil closed his discussion by stating that gifts and loans functioned in
Kapauku society to create emotional as well as econ omic obligation. In partic-
ular it was the role of the headman to foster obligation in the village and com-
munity. As a leader, the headman was required to be rich and generous, so that
h e possessed both th e m eans and the spirit to extend loans. In addition, he was
required to be eloquent, for in his judicial role he would persuade parties to in-
teract with each other, to create obligations within th e comm unity. Using a
combination of eloquen ce and economic threats of loan withdrawals, the
headman cem ented the political an d econom ic structure of the village.
Pospisil then reported that on his return to the Kapauku in 1969 the Dutch
could not account for the decline of the headman system. Concerned, they
asked him to analyze the situation. Examining his data after leaving the field, he
surmised that debts and credits had fallen by 65 percent in about four years.
The reason was the creation of a Dutch airstrip in the valley that h ad dramati-
cally altered the precontact economy. Instituting a wage system in which the
young men were paid in cash had diminished the headm an's authority and im-
portance as a donor of loans and an arranger of alliances. The collapse of the
economy led to the collapse of the legal and political system as well. This
proved that gift an d loan were critical to Kapauku society politically as well as
econom ically.
Discussion
During the discussion, Leopold Pospisil elaborated upon the value of
cowrie shell. The sh ells were available only on the south sh ore of the island.
Getting to them required the Kapauku to pass through territory under the con-
trol of lowland cannibals. Traveling the long and dan gerous route from the
mountains to the shore m ade shells difficult to get and very precious.
Asked about interest systems, Pospisil indicated that interest was calculated,
and there was also speculation in cowrie sh ells. He maintained that the Ka-
pauku had even constructed trusts, defining the structure of trusts through re-
ligious prohibitions that if transgressed would curse an individual for life. He
discussed the m athem atical system and claim ed that most Kapauku were excel-
lent and quick in the computation of problems in addition and subtraction.
They were equally quick in assigning monetary values to any object or service
that might be introduced to them .
Historian s and social scientists are fascinated by gifts not because they repre-
sent the free, voluntary benefactions of an individual but because their
"strings," the web of reciprocal expectations and obligations, reveal much
about the social, political, and economic relationships of their time and place.
It is in this light that I would like to view land grants in America, for they reveal
much about the political econ omy of the Am erican frontier and the develop-
m ent of the United States. In a series of case studies spanning the seventeenth
through the nin eteenth centuries, "strin gs" of obligation that identify the
30
sand be-
sources of political and economic authority and power will be identified, if not
be given
definitively discussed.
feen best
Let me begin in New York in the 168os. Governor Thomas Dongan, in order
this was
to increase immigration, encourage political allegiance of the colony's Dutch
s heirs at
residents to the English King, and preempt local demand for autonomy from
the Crown, made seven manorial grants to influential New Yorkers, including
ioned in
several of Dutch descent. Each grant bestowed title to thousands of acres as
·n partic-
well as the right to establish a court system, nominate religious ministers, and
md com-
appoint a representative to the colony's legislative assembly. Dongan also re-
.s, so that
lieved these manorial landlords of their burdensome quitrent obligations, im-
n, he was
posing in their place token payments.
·ies to in-
In return for these extensive grants, the landlords were expected to support
Using a
the governor's and the Crown's prerogatives in administering the colony, and
wals, the
underwrite the expense of settling and developing their lands. Local landlords,
however, enjoyed considerable latitude in meeting these obligations, for the
rre Dutch
distance that separated them from the Crown's power was surmounted only
ed, they
with difficulty in the seventeenth century.
! field, he
Dongan's grants made explicit three sets of fundamental relationships in
colonial America. First, land was worth little to colony or Crown unless it was
nramati-
peopled and developed. Second, although the Crown claimed sovereign title to
hich the
all lands in the American domain, it lacked sufficient resources to settle them,
' andim-
thereby necessitating agreements with others to aid in this work. Finally, the
se of the
political identity, allegiance, and power of England's colonial subjects were se-
ell. This
!swell as
cured best through ownership of land in titles given by the Crown.
The prerogatives of the colony and the Crown can again be viewed in a mid-
eighteenth-century land grant dispute concerning the Indian agent, fur trader,
and landlord Sir William Johnson. Johnson reported that leaders of the Mo-
hawk Indian castle of Canojoharie, alarmed by the threat posed by unscrupu-
value of
lous individuals in falsifying claims to their land that might then be honored by
the Crown, proposed "giving" him a tract containing an estimated forty to one
hundred thousand acres. Johnson throughout the ensuing dispute contended
that this agreement was indeed a gift, although he acknowledged that in return
he made a gift of twelve hundred pounds sterling to the leaders and consider-
lculated,
able presents to each Mohawk family. Acting Governor Colden and his secre-
the Ka-
tary, Goldsborough Banyar, accused Johnson of attempting to evade Crown
ough re-
regulation that required all subjects to obtain a license from the government
· !ife. He
before purchasing Indian lands. They refused to consider Johnson's application
re excel-
for this license until he had amended it to include as fellow purchasers anum-
:raction.
ber of men who claimed to hold Crown licenses for the tract. These men in-
. service
cluded Colden and Banyar.
Of interest is the manner in which Crown officials asserted their right to
control the transfer of Native American land, and thus the configurations of
the rights and obligations created by the transfer. The Crown, while professing
y repre-
to believe in and protect Native American title, also claimed ultimate sover-
se their
eignty over all Native American land, refusing to concede that Indian govern-
.l much
ments could independently control the disposition of their estate. That the
Cl place.
colonial administration could effectively stalemate an attempt by local resi-
y reveal
dents to resolve land conflicts in the Mohawk Valley revealed the extent to
evelop-
which imperial authority had grown since the seventeenth century.
nteenth
Again after the American Revolution, the autonomy of the Mohawk Nation
tify the
was eclipsed by the international economics of the trans-Atlantic economy. Al-

31
lied with Crown loyalists during the Revolution, the Mohawks lost control of
their land in New York with the defeat of the British. To reward their loyalty,
however, Governor Haldimand of Canada granted them a tract along the
Grand River. The Mohawks accepted the offer only to discover that they could
not sell or dispose of this land on terms of their own choosing. In 1793, after
years of bitter dispute, the Crown regranted the land with a deed that explicitly
limited its transfer, sale, or alienation except to other members of the Six Na-
tion Iroquois Confederation. That the Crown could for the first time fully dis-
close its position, and that the Mohawks accepted the grant upon these terms,
suggested the extent to which by the end of the eighteenth century the Mo-
hawks had become economically, if not politically, dependent upon the imper-
ial system.
Another series of land grants illuminates the process by which thirteen
colonies became a federal republic. After the Peace of Paris established the po-
litical independence of the United States, among the chief obstacles to making
that independence an effective reality were disputes between former colonies
concerning their claims to western lands. Between 1781 and 1802, various states
agreed to grant the federal government their western claims. Proceeds from the
sale of these lands would be used to fund the operation of the federal govern-
ment, and the lands themselves would become new states. That the states
would agree to surrender their claims reflected the prevalent belief in the ideol-
ogy of agrarian republicanism, which held that democracy could survive only
in small, face-to-face communities. Each state's loss of land resulted in a gain
for the nation and for republicanism. Practicality and ideology met in the spirit
of these cessions.
Finally, I would like to jump to the Far West to take up two final examples of
government land grants. The Homestead Act of 1862 has long been viewed and
venerated as legislation that expressed the ideology of individual independence
made possible by a supportive but disinterested republican government. In its
ideals, as opposed to its practical record, the Homestead Act embodied a rela-
tionship of reciprocal responsibility between the federal government and its
citizens. The government was expected to develop its domain by giving it away
in small equal portions to industrious citizens who pledged to improve the
land, not for speculative gain but family support. That the terms of the act were
frequently unrealistic failed to dull its ideological appeal to generations of
Americans, who found it an honorable and congenial civic model.
In stark contrast to the Homestead Act, government land grants to the rail-
roads are still viewed as the embodiment of government misdirection and pri-
vate graft. Although government land grants provided the primary financing
for extending rail service throughout the American West, many westerners
complained that the railroads failed to provide fair, equitable service. It is not
for us to debate whether the railroads were guilty of corruption and
inefficiency, or victims of circumstances beyond their control, but to note the
anger that arose when westerners perceived· that the railroads had deceived
them. Local anger sparked much of the agrarian rebellions of the 188os and
1890s. This history of the western railroad presents a vivid demonstration of
what happens when a gift recipient fails to meet the "strings" attached to it.
In closing, I'd like to address briefly Indian land cessions to the United
States government. It is fashionable to regard Indian land treaties as closed
transactions whose provisions have little significance for us today. Indeed, over
the past fifteen to twenty years several proposals have been introduced in Con-

32
ttrol of
.oyalty, gress that would require the abrogation of all such treaties. In contrast, most
ng the Native American communities regard land treaties as viable documents estab-
rcould lishing a set of reciprocal obligations and expectations between themselves and
3, after the federal government, not as papers of final sale. Foremost among their ex-
plicitly pectations is a continuing consultation on matters of joint interest. I think the
.ix Na- agrarian activists of the late nineteenth century would understand th e disap-
lly dis- pointment and anger of Native Americans who feel that past promises are
terms, being ignored today.
e Mo-
There was no discussion of this paper since illness prevented its presentation at the
imper-
conference.

irteen
he po-
Greeting Cards and American John Fleckner began his observations on the history and marketing of greeting
naking
Consumer Culture cards by highlighting their peculiar place within American consumer culture.
>lonies
He stated that while cards are representative of mass-produced commodities,
; states
john Fleckner they are also anomalous in that their sole function is to be given away rather
Dm the
than consumed by the purchaser. Highly stylized objects, cards are designed to
overn-
accommodate some degree of personalization in the space allowed for a writ-
states
ten message from the purchaser. In sum, they are objects associated with tradi-
ideol-
tions of gift exchange and sentimentality, while simultaneously belonging to a
e only
vast consumer industry that claimed more than $7 million in sales for 1990.
a gain
The mass-produced American greeting card had its origins in the valentine
:spirit
craze of the 184os. Esther Howland of Worcester, Massachusetts, combined m a-
chine-cut lace paper with lithographic images popular on English cards of the
ples of
time to create the American valentine (figure 12). She employed women to
~d and
hand-assemble the products and sold as m any as one hundred thousand cards
per season at the height of her business.

were
DDS of

e rail-
.d pri-
mcing
erners
is not
1 and

te th e
:eived
sand

it.
Jnited
:losed
., over Figure 12 . Three examples of nineteenth- century lithographic lace-and-cutwork greeting cards of the type fi rst manufactured
Con- in the United States by Esther Howland of Worcester, Massachusetts. (Photograph fro m N ational Museum of American His-
tory, Archives Center, Smithsonian Institution.)

33
 After the Civil War, when production of commercial visual imagery
boomed, the nascent gift card industry expanded to incorporate illustrated re-
tail or business cards. These cards, used to announce a firm's opening or extend
greetings to customers, were handsomely produced utilizing new lithographic
color printing processes. Despite the business association of these cards, they
continued to display sentimentalized imagery like landscapes and flower
sprays. Indeed, business cards were often identical to the personalized gift cards
now sent to Aunt Kate or Cousin Amelia at Christmas or Easter. Unlike today's
cards, however, business and personal gift cards were prized and saved by their
recipients. Scrapbooks that now fill archives and museums are literally bursting
with nineteenth-century greeting card remains.
Of the many nineteenth-century printers producing visual materials, Lewis
Prang is perhaps the best known. A tireless entrepreneur, Prang pursued tech-
nological innovations in printing, marketing, and advertising. He developed a
large and diverse product line that was displayed to purchasers in sample books
designed for traveling salesmen to carry (figure 13). He published a series of an-

Figure 13. A sample design for a

Christmas card manufactured and
promoted by the nineteenth-century
art card entrepreneur Lewis Prang.
Illustrations such as this one were in-
corporated into sample books that
traveling salesmen would then dis-
play to customers in order to encour-
age sales. (Photograph from National
Museum ofAmerican History,
Archives Center, Smithsonian Insti-
tution.)

34
magery
1ted re- nouncements to the trade as well as the general press promoting the artists he
extend employed and providing samples of their designs. During the 188os he spon-
graphic sored a design contest that provided him widespread attention and the compli-
is, they ment of imitation from other publishers. Yet, despite his entrepreneurial inno-
flower vations, Prang saw himself as part of an older fine arts tradition. His company,
ft cards known until its demise as The Art and Educational Publishers, continued to
today's carry extensive lines of fine art and later photographic reproductions that rep-
)y their resented a sizable percentage of his sales.
rsting In the first decade of the twentieth century, cards like those produced by
Prang were displaced by imported penny postcards from Germany. These were
·,Lewis in turn displaced by the products of the new greeting card industry pioneered
a tech- by Joyce Hall, of Hallmark, and Fred Rust, founder of Rustcraft. These new-
loped a look cards combined imagery with a poetic or narrative text and space for a
books personalized greeting on sheets of folded paper ready for insertion in a made-
of an- to-order envelope. Even more far-reaching than the changes to the product
were Rust's and Hall's philosophy. These new manufacturers had no preten-
sions to high art or even sophisticated handcraft. Joyce Hall, like Fred Rust,
came to cards from a retail sales rather than an artist's background and train-
ing. The result was cheaper production methods, more sophisticated market-
ing developments, "artists" drawn from high school commercial art classes, and
dramatically improved sales.
By the decades of the 1940s and 1950s the highly conventional and formulaic
imagery offered by mainstream greeting card companies made it obvious that
though cards were gifts, and a kind of communication between individuals,
they also were vehicles for the transmission and reinforcement of widespread
social beliefs and values. As illustrated in Father's Day cards (cards that were
developed by an industry hoping to exploit new occasions for the exchange of
cards), gender conventions of the mid-twentieth century were reinforced
(figure 14). Associating images of masculinity like automobiles, liquor, and cig-
ars with various stereotypical images of women made clear just how and what
a man should be (figure 15).
During these same decades, greeting card manufacturers established in-
creasingly sophisticated and intricate systems of marketing and public rela-
tions. They advertised in national magazines, where readers were assured that
by choosing a card that reflected their personality, they were indeed offering a
personal greeting. Companies also developed slogans to provide an identity for
their increasingly identical products and to ensure consumer identification
and loyalty to their cards. The all-time champion in peaking consumer recall
and establishing brand-name identity was and is Hallmark's 1944 slogan
"When you care to give the very best." By suggesting that the product pur-
chased was the very best, the purchaser could avoid the fact that it was also the
very least that could be bought and given, thereby drawing the purchaser
deeper into the web of a consumer system that appealed to people's needs and
aspirations and offered them a commodified means to achieve them.
In the 1950s Rustcraft joined other American manufacturers in creating a
fictional character to provide a more vivid identity to their product lines.
"Rustie" ofRustcraft was a peculiar combination of old-fashioned barnstormer
and modern cover girl (figure 16). Press releases disseminating the facts of a
fictitious biography claimed her as only the fourth woman jet pilot, a crack
rifle shot, and an expert cook. As a living trademark and symbol of sentiment,
Rustie's task was to make personal appearances and edit a trade publication

35
Figure 14. Father's Day cards like this
1935 Rustcraft example helped to re-
inforce mid- twentieth-century gen-
der conventions by associating tradi-
tionally masculine activities like
hunting with fath erhood. (Photo-
graph from National Museum of
American History, Archives Center,
Smithsonian Institution.)

known as Sentiment M agazine in order to encourage dealers to buy cards, re-

tailers to sell cards, and link a network of greeting card clerks throughout the
country directly to Rustcraft. Rustcraft also promised dealers increased sales
through modern ideas of retail management. The Rustcraft Institute offered
participating stores help in solving the age-old retail problems of volume and
profit. Promoting their in-house-designed nine-tier card display models, they
offered retailers more display in less space with promises of up to a 50 percent
sales increase. Through the institute, Rustcraft helped promote a scientific or at
least a rationalized approach to marketing in the greeting card industry.
In today's card market three firms, Hallmark, Gibson, and American Greet-
ings, dominate the industry with 84 percent of the market share. They com-
mand premium retail space and high profit margins and aggressively seek new
sales. Extending Joyce Hall's and other manufacturers' sales techniques into the
modern information age, Hallmark now maintains a data base of daily card
sales to determine even minute fluctuations in taste. This attention is undoubt-
edly rewarded. A national consumer survey for the greeting card association
concluded that people prefer greeting cards over letters and telephone calls for
expressions of thanks, consolation, friendship, etc. Among the respondents

36
 Figure 15. Hoping to exploit new oc-
casions for the exchange ofgreeting
cards, manufacturers promoted Fa-
ther's Day cards like this 1935 Rust-
craft example. (Photograph from Na-
tional Museum ofAmerican History,
OreclinQ_s to Dad
Archives Center, Smithsonian Insti-

~
on father's Da1J
tution.) ou. do so nluch
.11 thro •<6h 1hc ~o•r
To bri~tcn ram1l~ ties.
i \11 chc~r t? ~ou.
C'n fO..tfic.r's Oa.\1
And man~ a ~lad su~Drise.

there was consensus that expression of love and affection should be in writing.
Eighty-two percent of the respondents personalized their cards with m essages
or photographs.
Highly stylized, ephemeral, seemingly inconsequential, greeting cards re-
main a ubiquitous form of material culture in the twentieth century. In a soci-
ety given to ever-increasing consumption, greeting cards continue to fill a
small but significant place in the creation of interpersonal bonds and the
affirmation of relationships in a mobile and dispersed society. Their persis-
tence is also a testimony to sophisticated technologies of manufacturing and
marketing and to the innovations of industry in a consumer culture that were
capable of matching changing consumer values to a product.

Figure 16. In an effort to provide a

vivid identity for its product line,
Rustcraft created the fictional charac-
ter of"Rustie" to serve as a type of
living trademark. In press releases,
"Rustie" was described as a crack
rifle shot and an accomplished pilot,
as well as an expert cook and editor
ofRustcraft's Sentiment Magazine.
(Photograph from National Museum
ofAmerican History, Archives Cen-
ter, Smithsonian Institution.)

o the Discussion
card A spirited discussion followed John Fleckner's presentation, in which the
ubt- merits of greeting cards as worthy objects of exchange were debated. A survey
tion was taken, showing that all conference participants and observers had pur-
s for chased and given greeting cards, if not regularly, then on some occasions.
lents All agreed that cards were fascinating and an important part of American

37
 existence, but here consensus broke down. It was mentioned that the uses of
cards were very complex. Citing the common Smithsonian Institution practice
of gathering a yearly Christmas card list from staff in order that the Secretary
might send an official card that would build or honor a relationship with a per-
son in order to facilitate fund raising, or link institutions, a portion of the
group viewed cards as a sincere method for creating personal relationships. It
was mentioned that in many cases card purchasers spend an extraordinary
amount of time choosing an appropriate card that may say something in the
prepared verse or with the image that the donor perhaps cannot say in a face-
to-face relationship. Citing Hallmark's slogan, some members of the audience
claimed that traveling to the store, buying and sending a card is an indication
that there is some investment in this process and that it is this investment that
is recognized and appreciated by the recipient, whether he or she values the
card itself or not. As stated concisely by John Fleckner, this particular group of
participants viewed cards as reinforcing the gift-exchange process no matter
what the content or material nature of the gift.
A significant portion of the group failed to agree. Again referring to the so-
phisticated use of cards in American life, some participants emphasized the
negative aspect of card exchange as one that, while recognizing the recipient,
subtly or not so subtly puts him or her down as deserving only an ephemeral
token. A card to them was the least that could be given, a gesture that, at its
most distant, failed to require any personal interaction. Members of this group
objected to the equation of greeting cards with textiles, citing the care, com-
mitment, and hours of work together with the face-to-face exchange that a gift
of textiles required. Greeting cards were viewed as the chintziest way, an insult-
ing way, of occasioning a personal transaction.
Whatever their merits, the American use of greeting cards seems to be
spreading throughout the world. Hallmark claims to market widely overseas. It
was mentioned that in Muslim countries and regions cards are now sent to ac-
knowledge the end of Ram adan . There are also Rabbi cards that are prized,
kept, and traded almost like baseball cards in America.

The Gift of Giving: Introducing the subject of American philanthropy, Jean-Christophe Agnew
Philanthropy in America hailed the final scene of Henry James's novel The Wings of the Dove (1902) as
capturing an image true to the spirit of American philanthropy as understood
Jean- Christophe Agnew both popularly and academically. In that scene, two lovers and fortune hunters,
Kate Croy and Merton Densher, meet in a classic Jamesian moment of mutual
recognition. They have for a long time conspired to marry Merton, an impov-
erished esthete, to Milly Theale, an innocent, consumptive American heiress, in
order to use Milly's fortune upon her death as their dowry. But Milly, having
discovered the plot, dies. And the two conspirators now contemplate their own
future as they gaze upon the unopened letter before them . The envelope con-
tains Milly's "stupendous" bequest to Merton, and by implication a bequest to
both victimizers, in other words the novel.
It was this "stupendous" gift, a sacralizing act of forgiveness and philan-
thropy, that showed that Milly in addition to money also possessed the gift of
giving her fortune away. With this gesture, a gesture interpreted by some critics
and perhaps by James himself as one of sacrifice and unction that canonized
Milly Theale, James effectively juxtaposed her character to the calculating por-
traits of the two plotters. It is this same juxtaposition of philanthropy against

38
 ;es of
the market, like gifts against commodities, that characterizes both academic
tctice
and popular discourse about philanthropy. Indeed so powerful is this ideal of
etary
philanthropy that we see its opposite not as misanthropy or miserliness, but as
per-
mercenary self-interest governed by the expectation of return, exactly James's
f the
characterization of Kate and Merton.
s. It
The poet Lewis Hyde, in his inspirational study The Gift: Imagination and
mary
n the the Erotic Life of Property (1983), considers art itself to be the ultimate gift. Ac-
cording to Hyde, art is a kind of property that in its endless cycle of exchange
face-
and consumption, stands in stark contrast to the arid reciprocities of the mar-
tence
ketplace. Gifts have momentum. They must always move from one hand to an-
ation
other with no assurances of return. Thus they erase the boundaries of "mine"
and "thine" as constructed by commodity exchange. That is, they sacralize what
commodities secularize. This is the aura that surrounds Milly Theale's bequest.
Agnew then identified cultural philanthropy as the gift that keeps gifts of
art, music, and dance circulating. He queried whether by this definition phil-
anthropy is not anything less than a twofold gift. For the act of sacralization
works two ways. First the gift tends to sacralize itself and its sources, with the
result that wealth is abstracted from the market system and converted into a
gift or endowment itself. According to anthropologist Theresa Odendahl, this
type of sacralization obscures its origins in the market and allows money or
goods to be seen as Good. Second, he pointed to the work of Lawrence Levine,
who sees nineteenth-century institutions such as the Chicago Symphony and
even Joseph Henry's Smithsonian as a sustained effort in what he called "cul-
tural sacralization." Philanthropy protects canonized institutions by preserving
them from the grasp of commercial culture. Indispensable to bolh of these for-
mulations is the image of philanthropy's nonmarket or even antimarket spirit.
Agnew then queried why our culture finds the antagonism between gift and
as. It
commodity so compelling. Citing a range of anthropologists and ethnographic
D ac-
studies, Agnew maintained that this work suggests that gift exchange is actually
ized,
no less calculated or more spontaneous than commodity exchange. Anthropol-
ogists of the "substantivist school;' such as Christopher Gregory, teach us that
the calculations surrounding gift exchange and the hierarchy bred by these cal-
culations exist but are of a different order than those entailed in commodity
exchange. The result of this difference is that the two forms are incommensu-
rable although not incompatible. For example, individual commodities may be
transformed into individual gifts and vice versa, but commodity systems can-
not be transformed into gift systems. Whatever the mechanisms used to purge
commodity exchange in American society, these efforts are never entirely effec-
tive. Turning again to the work of Theresa Odendahl, Agnew endeavored to il-
lustrate the "pay-off" or social return, the calculation and hierarchy implied in
the American philanthropic system.
own
According to Agnew, Odendahl found that half of all private philanthropy
;on-
comes from a very small percentage of the rich. Although she found that a
it to
small proportion of these funds does go to social welfare programs, she con-
cluded that most philanthropic donors continue to create and subsidize insti-
lan-
tutions that effectively serve the affluent, serve them, that is, as a source of sym-
ft of
bolic capital, an alternative to conspicuous consumption. Here lies the social
itics
return. These gifts stand against the image of the free market, while preserving
ized
the laissez-faire ideological foundation of this market by honoring the per-
or-
sonal power and discretionary ability of the donors to put money where they
nst
wish, thereby emulating and affirming the ideology of the free market as a

39
place to dispose of one's income, freely. Philanthropy also links these two seem-
ingly contrasting economies in that it offers an alternative to the reallocative
power of the tax system while simultaneously using the tax system to deter-
mine the amount to be given according to the deductibility limits of the tax
code. Time and again Odendahl reports that her wealthy informants stated that
they gave as much as is allowed. Thus, in American philanthropy the ideal of a
completely free and altruistic gift a distinctly market-associated definition.
Continuing her description of the culture of American philanthropy, Oden-
dahl fo und that the strongest ties created through gift lay within the philan-
thropic community rather than between it and less-advantaged beneficiaries. A
chain of gifts can be detected in the donations the wealthy make to each other's
charities. This is as close to the Kula Ring as we're likely to get, and a profound
illustration of the exclusionary nature of gift exchange. As Lawrence Levine ar-
gued, culture may be available at free admission, but it must be accepted upon
the terms proffered by those who control the cultural institutions.
An understanding of gift can lead us to reread philanthropy's role in a com-
mercial society just as it can lead us to reread the final scene of The Wings of the
Dove. It could be read, as so many commentators and perhaps James intended,
as a near-perfect allegory of sacrifice and redemption. But texts, like gifts, are
rarely in the complete control of their donors (authors), and I am inclined to
see this as a story to be about the exchange of one man between two women.
Kate gives Merton to Milly, and then Milly returns him with a seemingly free
increase. But the force of Milly's bequest, its size and gratuitousness, irrevoca-
bly shatter the relation between the conspirators. Kate's words, "We shall never
be again as we were," acknowledge that they were together only in trying to ex-
propriate Milly's fortune, and now find themselves divided and conquered by
her philanthropy.
The same has been said of philanthropy in general. By means of a preemp-
tive gift, philanthropy defeats more far-reaching redistributions of wealth.
With philanthropy, as with so many other things, Henry James turns out to be
a far better anthropologist than he knew.

Discussion
Following Jean-Christophe Agnew's presentation, a variety of issues related
to the comparative cultural dimensions of philanthropy were raised. Some par-
ticipants noted that there is far less private giving in Europe than in America
and suggested that a reason for this might lie in the very different relationship
between cultural institutions and the state throughout Europe. It was stated
that a religious, even Christian dimension needed to be considered in any dis-
cussion of American philanthropy. The vast bulk of generalized giving is to
churches. This type of gift is interesting, for it seems to be an investment, trea-
sure in heaven, given perhaps to insure that elites might also make it to heaven.
Other comments centered upon American philanthropy as acculturating
children in giving in order to form and aid in the reproduction of a class. Sta-
tus and honor, in addition to tax laws, may encourage the heirs of philan-
thropists to continue in this tradition. Philanthropy might be a m ethod for so-
lidifying family alliances through gift. It was noted that philanthropy places
exchange within a history, so that the names associated with it live on. In this
instance, history itself might enter into the equation relating commodities and
gifts. Finally, the very word philanthropy and its etymology were questioned, as
was the relationship of philanthropy to charity.

40
~m-

tive POWER AND PROPITIATION: POLITICAL AND RELIGIOUS ASPECTS OF GIFT GIVING
ter-
tax Giving to Get: In this presentation I want to focus on changing relations of power and propi-
:hat Tributes and Offerings tiation in Central Sulawesi, Indonesia. Examining historical documentation on
in Central Sulawesi, Indonesia the political and religious offerings of small-scale highland societies and low-
:::>fa
land kingdoms will indicate that solutions to the questions of value that they
en- Lorraine V A ragon raise cannot be found solely within the framework of The Gift as Material Cul-
~n- ture. Rather, as suggested by Marcel Mauss long ago, nonmaterial valuables
s.A such as the access to trade markets, slaves, wives, and religious blessing must be
er's recognized as important in Oceanic gift exchange. Instead of a balanced reci-
md procity in objects, it is the reproduction of social relations through things that
ar- is sought in gift exchange.
JOn
First a few specifics about gift giving and power in Indonesia. The prevailing
Indonesian concept of power is one in which political power is qualitatively the
m- same as religious power. Since spiritual power is invisible, its presence must be
.the inferred primarily by exterior signs such as wealth, status, and influence. These
.ed, outward qualities were not considered instrumental in gaining power, rather
are they were considered evidence of power's previous existence. Therefore, valu-
l to able gifts in these societies were given and received as claims to extend political
en. and religious status, not simply to achieve a material return on an investment.
iree For their former owners at least, most Indonesian prestige gift items, such as
ca- those that could be seen in the exhibition Beyond the Java Sea, had significant
ver cosmic power. In some cases this power derived from the identity of the penul-
ex- timate owner, in other cases from associations with a longer genealogy. Their
by giving entailed social obligation and hierarchy, yet these obligations were am-
biguous especially when they involved different ethnic groups. It is not correct
to automatically assume that either one side or the other in an exchange uni-
versally holds the higher status. I would suggest that the higher-status partici-
pants are the ones best able to define the nature of the exchange. In some situ-
ations it may be to one side's greater advantage to give gifts in order to create
obligation, while at another time receiving tribute may be best. Thus there
commonly existed two different interpretations of the significance of identical
:ed gifts.
ar- I will now focus upon twentieth-century political and religious gifts in Cen-
tca tral Sulawesi that were presented to traditional deities, highland aristocrats,
tip and lowland kingdom rulers. This immediately places us beyond the realm of
:ed luxury valuables and into the realm of livestock, food items, and forest prod-
s- ucts. From these data, insights into highland-lowland political constructions
to will be discussed.
:a- In highland Central Sulawesi, gifts or sacrifices to autochthonous deities in-
:n. cluded buffalo, dogs, pigs, chickens, barkcloth, beads, and cooked food (figure
ng 17). These gifts were made in order to initiate or maintain a bargain with the
:a- deities and ancestors that would result in good rice harvests, strong houses,
n- abundant crops, recuperated children, or gold. Without promises to the gods
0-
and proper supplication and retribution, no good favor would be bestowed;
:es rather, revenge would be sought.
tis The same principles were applied to the relations between highland com-
1d moners and their aristocratic leaders, as well as between highlanders and their
as lowland tributary overlords. Gifts by highlanders to their community leaders
were a religious as well as a political matter. The series of small food and do-
mestic gifts like those provided to the deities allowed commoners to call upon

41
Figure 17. In Central Sulawesi,
gifts offoo d to prop itiate deities
were traditionally placed at the
base of the center post in the in-
digenous temple. (Photograp h
by L. Aragon.)

powerful nobles in times of need. Gifts between highlanders and lowlanders

were also political and spiritual in nature. As communities, highlanders gave
tribute gifts to lowland kingdoms through which they travelled for trading ex-
peditions (figure 18) . Like deities, and aristocrats within their own society, royal
lowland families were expected to make things go well in return for this tribute,
and in fact did so partly through material acts of generosity or military protec-
tion. Thus highlanders were not only giving gifts of subservience and worship
but staking political, economic, and spiritual claims by this type of exchange.
In the case of a marriage between a highland noblewoman and a lowland
royal man, the value and meaning of the tribute gifts and countergifts cannot
be assessed without reference to the political significance of the marriage.
When considered in this light, the subsequent gain by the lowland kingdom
was not only in tribute items but in greater political control at the periphery of
their geographical domain . The highland kingdom gained not just bridewealth
but a spiritual and kinship claim upon the lowland court. Thus an identical set
of gifts held two different interpretations. Again, the goal in these exchanges
was not so m uch balanced reciprocity as the construction of political and so-
cial relations through gifts.
With the shift in power to a Dutch colonial regime, the nature of Central
Sulawesi exchange principles altered. Tribute gifts from highlanders to lowland
42
 Figure 18. Painted barkcloths, used as head scarfs for men (a) and blouses for women (b), were among the tribute gifts given
by highlanders, who manufactured barkcloth, to lowland aristocratic leaders. (Photographs from Department ofAnthropol-
ogy, Smithsonian Institution.)

kingdoms were replaced by the Dutch government demand for taxes and road
labor. This compelled local men to obtain the necessary cash by harvesting and
selling forest resources. The institution of nineteenth-century "short con-
tracts," colonial government documents that Sulawesi headmen signed in igno-
rance only to discover that their land now belonged to the Netherlands Indies,
confused local chiefs who protested and often withheld their aid in helping the
Dutch realize their twin goals of native "uplift" and economic profit. Eventually
the Netherlands government realized that they would have to change their
strategy to meet their goals. They did so by supporting Protestant missionaries
who initiated gift-giving practices that would convert and attract the indige-
nous people.
As in the previous examples of gift exchange with deities, highland aristo-
crats, and lowland nobles, missionaries employed an exchange system that did
not seek balanced reciprocity but rather the construction of social relation-
ships. Salvation Army missionaries distributed previously unknown goods
royal such as European clothing, white sugar, candy, soap, and matches. They also
bute, administered medicines supplied by the Dutch government (figure 19). Colo-
otec- nial money was introduced by giving Dutch coins to school children and then
:ship requesting them back as church donations. By giving generous political gifts to
ge. local leaders, missionaries gained an audience for their religious message. In an
and extended process of proselytization, highlanders were convinced to sacrifice
nnot their livestock and offer first fruits of harvest to the Christian God rather than
tage. their traditional ones (figure 20). At the same time, the Dutch government dis-
dom rupted passage of tribute gifts to the lowland kingdoms and required instead
ry of taxes and road labor. The indigenous residents complied.
~alth
In short, just as highlanders had been strongly impressed by the power of
aset the lowlanders as expressed by their abundance of luxury goods and had there-
nges fore consented to participate in a gift-exchange system that passed tribute from
. so- the highlands to the lowlands, so the Central Sulawesi highlanders again
conflated technological expertise, as indicated in the new range of European
ttral luxury goods, with spiritual power. Thus they negotiated gift-exchange rela-
and tionships with the European missionaries and the Dutch government that ulti-

43
Figure 19- The Salvation Army initi-
ated Western medical care in many
Central Sulawesi regions through
early gifts of medicine and services.
Here two Indonesian Salvation Army
nurses administer a mother-and-in-
fant clinic now supported by local
fees. (Photograph by L. Aragon.)

Figure 20. Central Sulawesi high-

landers now deliver food gifts to the
Protestant God at the center post of
their church, in this case a church
still under construction. (Photograph
by L. Aragon.)

mately changed the political and religious constructions of highland Central

Sulawesi.
In conclusion, I ask: What do these data contribute to recent discussions of
gift exchange? First, they highlight the unity of political and religious ties be-
tween people and objects, and the long-term temporal ~imension of gift ex-
change. Second, they emphasize that gift-exchange analyses m ust be broad
enough to include nonmaterial gifts. Finally, they make clear that the Euro-
peans' ability to give novel and desirable gifts was at least as important to their
colonial strategies as their ability to use military force to back up their mission.
These strategies illustrate the use of gifts not to receive returns in kind, but
rather to forge an unequal relationship whereby old patterns of gift giving were
rearranged to suit the needs of the foreign gift givers.

Time did not allow for discussion.

44
 Indonesian Court Arts Helen Jessup began her discussion of the court arts of Indonesia noting that
the bases for gift giving in the courts of Indonesia were extremely complicated,
Helen Ibbitson Jessup although almost all of them were connected with power or propitiation. Jessup
continued by stating that the earliest known gifts associated with these courts
were certainly tributary. Chinese dynastic records of the fifth century noted
that even in the third century, delegations from Sumatra, probably from the in-
cipient Srivijaya kingdom, bore fealty to Chinese rulers in return for rights of
trade in Chinese-dominated regions.
The earliest written accounts of tribute organization in Indonesia came
from the Nagarakertagama, a poem written in A.D. 1365 by Prapanca, a poet of
the Majapahit Empire. In this poem he described the progress of the King Ra-
jasanagara, usually referred to as Hayam Wuruk, as he moved throughout his
realm receiving tribute in the form of agricultural products, and food from
commoners, and homage presents of exotic trade goods from nobles. As
recorded by Prapanca, these exotic goods comprised gold and luxurious cloth,
as well as exotic animals. In return the king was expected to ensure the pros-
perity of the kingdom through the redistribution of these assets to his subjects
and members of the court. Aristocrats would receive sophisticated trade goods
as well as the gift of names, that is, the gift of an honorable rank by royal ordi-
nation. Thus, in Java and Sumatra at least, kings acted as a force of redistribu-
tion to secure prosperity. Dependent upon the food and agricultural products
to support their courts, kings were required to redistribute homage goods to
shore up their political position with the nobility.
Within the redistributive system of trade goods and the prestigious objects
of internal manufacture, the most important gifts were those connected with
the maintenance of power and wealth. These gifts included metal products,
which as implements of agriculture and war were central to the practicality of
sustaining power and symbolically important as objects invested with affirma-
tions of glory and leadership status. They also included cloth, a prestige item in
Southeast Asia from earliest times, particularly cloth with ship images that em-
phasized the sustenance of life, and finally a range of objects associated with
rites of passage.
Jessup then discussed metal objects. As the conduit for cosmic power, the
metalsmith in Indonesia was generally depicted as barefoot, rooted in the earth
from which he would extract metal to combine with fire from the air in the
production of an instrument of awe and veneration. Of particular power and
interest among the many objects manufactured by the metalsmith was the kris,
tral or short, sometimes wavy-bladed stabbing weapon worn upon the person. An
implement of great artistic and spiritual power, each kris was thought to pos-
sess a spirit of its own that must blend well with that of its owner lest misfor-
tune result. Venerated for their.power as weapons, they were also forged to pro-
pitiate the spirits. Pakubuwono VII, for example, was instructed to have made
seven idenlical krises, with seven luk, or waves, an amazingly complex task for
the smith, in order to honor the cosmic spirits that were seen as the source of
the problems during his reign (figure 21). A gift of great power, krises were of-
on. fered in tribute as objects that signalled deep and ancient relationships.
but Pakubuwono X of Java, for example, gave the Raja of Gianyar a kris in brother-
ere hood. This was an interesting gift situation, since Java had once dominated that
region and this particular gift seemed to affirm a more egalitarian relationship
between the two kingdoms (figure 22) .
As the territories of the Indonesian courts were subsumed under colonial

45
Figure 21 . Kris Nagasapto, mid-
seventeenth century, Surakarta, Cen-
tral Java. One of the seven Nagasapto
krises with seven curves made for
Pakubuwono VII. (Collection of
K.R. T Hardjonagoro. Photograph by
John Go/lings, Courtesy of The Asia
Society.)

control, the rulers, in order to maintain the loyalty of subjects torn among gov-
ernments, created what is now known as the Cult of Magnificence. Seeking to
assure themselves and their subjects that Indonesian monarchs were still capa-
ble of bestowing blessings upon the people, they undertook ceremonial proces-
sions like the one previously described by Prapanca. Sultans and kings with
complete servant retinue, carriages glittering with gold and swathed in luxuri-
ous cloth, paraded before their subjects the gold objects that affirmed their
leadership and kingly status. Chief among these were the pusaka or sacred heir-
looms, kept hidden from direct gaze in large ornate cases or elaborate cloth
wraps, and the exclusive three-tiered umbrella of the sovereign. These proces-
sions reminded the people of the legitimacy and prosperity of their ruler, and
underscored their own prosperity and good fortune as the subjects of a rich
and generous monarch.
Within the confines of the courts themselves, there were other ceremonies
or rituals of kingship that required the wearing and display of regalia. Central
to these occasions was the display of the pusaka. In central Java at least, the
p usaka comprised a gold ceremonial set of objects known as the upacara. The

46
 upacara included gold spittoons, bowls, plates, and napkins, all the parapher-
nalia necessary to engage in rituals of hospitality and friendship such as the
eating of betel nut. In addition, the upacara included gold representations of
exotic tribute animals such as the peacock, snake, goose, and deer, each sym-
bolic of a moral quality. As celebrated disputes of sovereignty in the seven-
teenth and eighteenth centuries indicated, possession of the pusuku usually en-
dowed the possessor with the unquestionable rights to absolute royal power no
m atter what the circumstances of the kingdom. Such heirlooms were not mere
tokens, but taken to be signs of kingly legitimacy. For example, Amangkurat I,
fleeing his country after a military rout and the loss of his army and treasury,
retained some of the court pusaka, thereby attempting to deny his son
Amangkurat II the legitimacy to claim himself as king.
Given the spiritual and political power of the pusaka, the ultimate gift of
metal in Indonesian court circles was the presentation of pusaka to another
ruler. Never given to inferiors or superiors, gifts of pusaka indicated absolute
equality. At the turn of the twentieth century, when Queen Wilhelmina of the
Netherlands was married, Pakubuwono X had a replica of his own court's
pusaka made in gold to give to her as a wedding gift. It was an important gift
and one that recognized her legitimacy as Queen of Holland and head of that
kingdom's government in Indonesia, and yet maintained Pakubuwono X as her
legitimate equal.
In addition to metal objects, cloth played an important role as a prestige
item often used as a gift of tribute and offered during rites of passage and cele-
brations of life and fertility. The richly illustrated tampan or ship cloths of
Sumatra were generally associated with the power and might of the high nobil-
ity. Portraying ships filled with prestige animals like elephants and illustrated
with symbols of bounty and fertility, they were used to cover and surround ob-
jects offered during tribute exchanges. Ship images too appeared upon the
palepai, or ceremonial hangings given to and made for the aristocratic families
of Lampung. Associated with death, these cloths pictured ships thought to be
carrying the souls of the dead to the ancestors. Extraordinary achievements of
weaving, the complex imagery of these cloths united primordial Austronesian
themes and indigenous skill with the splendor of courtly manifestations of
power.
·ov- Figure 22. Kris Nagasasra, seven- Gifts of cloth that served tributary purposes while celebrating rites of pas-
g to teenth century, Cirebon, West Java. sage were also presented at marriages. Complex and ideologically significant,
pa- Although the provenance of this these gifts might include lacquer boxes filled with food and containing textiles,
:es- naga-decorated kris is Cirebon, the thereby summarizing the Austronesian concept of what a woman brought in
ith workmanship is typical of Central marriage exchange, while cementing relationships between the parties. In an-
Jfl- Java, illustrating the fusion of the other instance, Indian silk patola cloth from the dowry and heirloom collec-
1eir ironsmith's and goldsmith's arts. tion of the Court of Yogyakarta was presented to the Mangkunagaran court at
eir- The crowned naga's body follows the the marriage of the Sultan of Yogyakarta's daughter to Mangkunagoro VII.
oth shape of the blade, while its gold- Again the cloth affirmed the association between women and cloth in Indone-
:es- inlaid headdress echoes the floral sia, while the history and fineness of the material made this gift a powerful trib-
md meander encrusting the first three ute that affirmed the legitimacy of the donor as well as the receiver.
-ich luk. (Co llection of Museum This account of the images and objects associated with the legitimacy of the
Nasional, Jakarta. Photograph by rulers oflndonesia shows that the Indonesian courts evolved from and gave ex-
1ies Joh n Gollings, Courtesy of The Asia pression to Austronesian mythologies and themes of power. The artifacts of
tral Society.) courtly culture, such as the kris, pusaka, and a variety of cloths, can be read
the both as evidence of royal economic success and as an affirmation of the sym-
[he bolic importance of larger, almost universal, themes within the culture. This

47

Presidential Gifts in America
Alan Fern
Figure 23. Silver Indian Peace M edal,
1825, by Moritz Furst, from the p resi-
dency of John Quincy Adams. T he re-
verse carries the image of two clasped
hands with a crossed axe and p eace
pipe, and the words "Peace and
Friendship." The 75 mm. m edal is
pierced at the top so it could be worn
around the neck of the recipient.
(National Portrait Gallery, gift of
Andrew Oliver. Photograph f rom Na-
tional Portrait Gallery, Smithsonian
Institution.)
combination of power and images of myths of origin convinced the subjects of
these monarchs that the world they inhabited was both a harmonious and a
prosperous one.
Time did not permit a general discussion.
When I first agreed to speak on this topic, I had no idea that presidential gifts
would ever be so newsworthy. With Kitty Kelley's revelations about gifts and
gift recycling in the Reagan household, however, the whole subject has become
rather hot. I shall take a more scholarly approach than Ms. Kelley and try to
shed a little light on presidential generosity and motivation. Presidential gifts,
like other gifts, tangible expressions of a relationship or a desired relationship,
are thus an ideal topic for a seminar that seeks to use m aterial culture to illu-
minate other studies.
One of the first gift traditions, established by the first American president
and continued by his successors, was the presentation of medals to leaders of
the Indian nations (figure 23). British and French monarchs had done this for
m any years before the establishment of the American republic, and it was clear
that if Washington were to gain the attention and respect of native leaders he
would have to issue medals of his own. The Washington peace medal portrayed
the President offering a gesture of conciliation to a peace-pipe-smoking Native
American, who had dropped his tomahawk to the ground. While we are all
conscious of the subsequent treachery and injustice suffered by Native Ameri-
cans at the hands of both the government and individual American settlers,
these m edals were treasured by the recipients, pierced and affixed to elaborate
neckpieces, and so preserved fo r future generations. Th ey remained personal,
even tribal treasures, suggesting the retention of some residue of respect or es-
teem on the part of the Native Americans.
Immediately after Washington's presidency, peace medals assumed a differ-
ent m essage, proclaiming on their reverse "Peace and Friendship" beneath a
representation of crossed axe and calumet and clasped hands. Half a century
later, after hundreds of clashes and dozens of wars, a n ational policy dictating
"Americanization" or "civilization" of Native Am erican peoples was expressed
upon the reverse of th e m edals by the phrase "Peace and Progress." No longer
was friendship the goal of the relationship. Progress, which required submit-
ting to public schooling and using the white man's agricultural technique, was
to be rewarded. By design these m edallic gifts themselves served as a reminder
of what was expected politically from an encounter with an official govern-
m ent emissary.
Political gifts intended to cem ent relationships or preempt the forceful ap-
propriation of tribute extend far back in recorded history. Early in our own na-
tional history, gift exchange was established as a m ethod for creating relation-
ships. Apart from a few n otable exceptions, h owever, these American gifts
esch ewed the grandeur and extravagance displayed in the offerings of some
European and Middle Eastern countries. For example, Martha Washington
gave a miniature of the President to his nephew Bushrod, who later presented it
to Simon Bolivar as a token of respect and shared political ideals. Today scores
of presidential photographs given to ambassadors, cabinet officers, and other
significant officials from around the world serve a similar end.
Within the country simple gifts also served an integrative purpose. On more
than one occasion, Washington presented silver spurs to a deserving subordi-
48
 f
nate. These spurs were the forerunners of the PT-109 tie clips given by John F.
Kennedy and the cufflinks and tie clips offered by Nixon, Reagan, and Bush to
their supporters. Even more modest, though perhaps more politically
significant, were the pens used by presidents to sign legislation into law. Given
to the writers, sponsors, and supporters of the legislation, they were retained by
their recipients as tokens of friendship, symbols of political affiliation, and sou-
venirs indicating that the receiver occupied a place close to the seat of power.
s
While not objects of intrinsic value (Kennedy, for example, used Bic pens),
i
they were rich with associations.
e
Gifts to the presidents provide an equally interesting study. Until the
)
Kennedy administration when some escalation in political gift exchange oc-
curred, presents from the president to other leaders tended to be books or pic-
tures, readily available in the trade, that told something of American history
and culture. Return gifts from other heads of state would be of a comparably
modest nature. On rare occasions a decoration might be presented, such as the
t
Order of the Cincinnati medal presented to Washington by the French Navy, or
f
an important political artifact such as the key to the Bastille. American presi-
dents have broken with the rules of modesty in giving on diplomatically essen-
tial occasions. For example, a fully operative steam engine was presented to the
e
Japanese Emperor by Commander Perry at the "opening" of Japan to the West,
d
and President Nixon gave Soviet Premier Breshnev a Cadillac Eldorado, a Lin-
e
coln Continental, and a golf cart during negotiations of a preliminary disarma-
u ment treaty.
In fact, there has been an extraordinary escalation of presidential gift giving
i,
and receiving in recenl administrations. President and Mrs. Johnson, for exam-
e
ple, received Irish eighteenth-century silver from the Republic of Ireland's
l,
Prime Minister, Eamon D e Valera; a ceremonial leather saddle from India's
Prime Minister, Indira Gandhi; and a German hunting rifle from Chancellor
Erhardt. Whether these practices escalated during the Nixon administration, or
were only more widely known as the result of the conscientious repor ting re-
quired by the 1966 Foreign Gifts and Decorations Act, President Nixon received
more than $2 million worth of state gifts. The level dropped during the Carter
years, only to jump back up to six figures during the Reagan presidency.
The exchange of gifts is always fraught with hidden dangers. Adept diplo-
:r
m atic and political benefactors learn that to avoid danger one should strictly
observe protocol: one of the first lessons of gift giving and receiving in the po-
IS
litical forum is that a recipient at the donor's m ercy may appear ridiculous.
:r
Unsolicited gifts are viewed with suspicion. So in late 1984, when two bottles of
superb Soviet vodka were sent to the Washington Navy Yard, they were deto-
)-
nated without tasting. The niceties of protocol must be observed to ensure a
gift's appropriate reception!
1- Figure 24. A n unidentified Puerto
I want to end my talk with another category of gifts. These are unsolicited
I- Rican artist sculpted President H arry
presents to American presidents that are eloqu ent expressions of gratitude and
S S Truman in a coconut and presented
affection that come directly from citizens. Portraits of Jimmy Carter in wood,
e the portrait to the president. The
Harry Truman sculpted in a coconut (figure 24), and the cowboy boots sent to
presidential libraries and archives
President Eisenhower speak clearly about the nature of celebrity in American
it contain m any such folk images, un-
politics.
~s solicited gifts sent to the Chief Execu-
What does this all m ean? I have to leave that to the anthropologists, histori-
~r tive in a spirit of affection or resp ect.
ans, and psychologists among us. Manifestly, the study of presidential gifts
(Harry S Truman Library-Museum,
given and received is a fascinating study and one that deserves more system atic
:e Independence, Missouri. Photograph
attention than I have time for today. I hope that before long one of you will
1- by Henry Groskinsky. )
write a book to organize and interpret this body of political lore.

49

Colonial Boston Church Silver:
Gifts of Community, Commitment,
and Continuity
Gretchen Townsend
Figure 25. Standing cup manufac-
tured by Paul Revere, 1758, as gift
from Reverend Thomas Prince to his
congregation. (Co llection of Old
South Church, Boston. Photograph
from Museum of Fine Arts, Boston.)
Discussion
In a shortened discussion period, Alan Fern entertained a few questions
about his presentation. When asked about the commercial aspect of some indi-
vidual gifts to presidents, he responded that many people do send things to the
White House hoping to secure the American equivalent of a Royal Warrant. He
noted that of course no endorsements are ever made. He further elaborated
upon citizen gifts, stating that they are all generally on view in the presidential
libraries and taken very seriously by the libraries' staff. Even relatively unpopu-
lar presidents seem to receive quite a number of them.
At his death in 1758, Reverend Thomas Prince, minister of Boston's Old South
Church, graced his congregation with a small legacy for the purchase of a silver
chalice (figure 25). Prince's gift was a well-recorded example of one of the most
common rituals of gift exchange in colonial New England: the furnishing of a
church communion table with donations of money or silver plate. My attempts
to understand these gifts resulted in two sets of questions. The first set involves
the events surrounding the initial offer and reception of the gift. The second
concerns these objects as they were used and understood by generations of
communicants. My sources comprise a group of one hundred well-docu-
mented silver objects owned by Boston Congregational, Presbyterian, and Bap-
tist churches before the American Revolution. They include large flagons that
served as storage vessels as well as smaller tankards, chalices or standing cups,
beakers, and mugs that actually reached the hands of those in the congregation.
Although theology and church policy varied within and among Protestant
congregations before the American Revolution, all these churches maintained
an essential post-Reformation understanding of the Communion ritual. Com-
munion, or the Lord's Supper, was both an expression of an individual's faith
and a proclamation of the unity of purpose of the church community. In this
ritual believers commemorated the sacrifice of Christ by taking bread and
wine, symbols of his body and blood. Rejecting the Roman Catholic belief in
the power of the priest to effect a transubst~ntiation of bread and wine, Com-
munion in these Protestant churches became a way for individuals to internal-
ize the spiritual truth of Christ's death and promote its action in their hearts.
This theologically democratic Communion impulse had logical repercus-
sions in the physical performance of the ritual. In a reformed service, both ele-
ments were distributed among the people in the pews. Blessed by one minister,
then offered to other ministers and ruling elders, the bread was then passed to
the congregation by deacons. The deacons also distributed wine in a similar
fashion. Within the pews, communion vessels moved from hand to hand
around the meeting house. In this way communicants were themselves givers
and receivers of the bread and wine, and silver communion vessels functioned
as crucial props in the gift at the heart of the ritual.
In the reform traditions, Communion was a special celebration of the unity
of the true church, and in its own way highly exclusive. It reinforced a defini-
tion of community in which the saved were differentiated and separated from
the damned. The fact that precious metal vessels were passed between commu-
nicants was significant. For at a time when only 5 percent of all Bostonians
owned silver for domestic use, Communion m ade symbolic ownership of this
precious material a reality to all who could pass the trials and examination of
spirit to enter into the religious community. This is not to say that all worldly
50

s erarchy of the Communion ritual itself, spiritual and temporal distinctions
l beneficent benefactors, who personified a kind of noblesse oblige in which the
[
Figure 26. Communion plate from
First Church, Boston. Bottom row,
left to right: cup, flagon, beaker,
tankard, beaker, flagon, cup. Top
row: standing cups. (From A.B. ]ones,
The Old Silver of American
Churches, plate 13. Photograph from
Department ofAmerican Art Li-
brary, Yale University Art Gallery.)
pretensions were left at the door of the meeting house. For as shown by the hi-
were hopelessly tangled in this feast.
The donors of the objects studied were related to the recipient churches by
personal identification, personal and family history, or finally as general
donor, for example the Lieutenant Governor, might honor all parishes within
his domain with a silver gift. Roughly 70 percent of the donors were men, usu-
ally wealthy and prominent, while 20 percen t were women, and the remaining
10 percent couples or groups.
In the seventeenth century, it was not unusual for donors to give churches
highly ornate European silver originally used domestically for the communion
table. No distinction between domestic wares and church silver existed. In the
eighteenth century, however, the use of the cup or chalice declined, and there
appeared a preference for smooth-walled beakers and matching vessels (figure
26). Many gifts of church silver were actuated after the death of the donor as
stipulated by will. Typically the form of the vessel was left unspecified, the
donor providing a sum of money for the silver's purchase. Hence, the choice of
form often fell to the donor's executors or on some occasions the needs of the
church.
Church silver was generally inscribed with the name of the donor, the
church, and the date of the gift (figure 27). There was often a consistency of in-
scription within the silver furnishings of a particular church. New objects
tended to bear inscription in the manner of their predecessors even if those in-
scriptions were unusual. For example, New South Church inscribed donors'
occupations on a series of beakers given over the course of the eighteenth cen-
tury.
Consideration of inscriptions brings me to the first set of questions that
must be answered in order to understand the gift of church silver. Namely, was
the inscription of the name of the donor a way to remind communicants in a
moment of religious solemnity of the earthbound rules of the social order?
51

Figure 27. Standing cup of English
manufacture, 1610- 11, presented to
First Church, Boston, by fohn
Winthrop. (From ]ones, op. cit., plate
8. Photograph from Department of
American Art Library, Yale Univer-
sity Art Gallery.)
Certainly the gift of a flagon by Governor Dummer to the Hollis Street Church
appeared to celebrate his economic power and considerable social standing.
The Church's deferential response to his gift supports this interpretation. On
the other hand, perhaps donors merely wished to perpetuate their memory
through gift, for it generally fell to their executors to provide the inscription. If
this were true, then Reverend Prince's gift would be more typical than that of
Governor Dummer. His was a plain chalice, meant to be shared by an intimate
clan. He gave perhaps because much had been given to him. Identification of a
precious religious object with a prominent member of the community proba-
bly did reaffirm the social order. It might also have enhanced a congregation's
sense of continuity and reminded them that God's past care reassured future
blessing.
What, then, went through the minds of communicants as they raised one of
these precious vessels to their lips? As with the first set of questions, the second
category defies a single answer. All who enjoyed the use of the silver had a wide
array of personal, social, and spiritual meanings that they could invest in the
object. Edward Taylor, pastor and metaphysical poet, imagined himself at the
moment of Communion as a chalice for the sacramental wine. In the Apostle
Paul's Second Letter to Timothy, he encouraged Christians to think of them-
selves as vessels of the Lord. It is likely that the name of another Christian in-
scribed on a communion vessel conjured such associations and encouraged the
faithful by reminding them of the victorious life of one of their number, a life
that friends might have considered a gift to the community.
In handling a vessel, New Englanders might have remembered the generos-
ity of the donor, the spiritual and material interdependence of members of
their community, God's grace in the life of their church , or like Taylor visual-
ized themselves as a vessel of Christ. They no doubt thought of the unfath-
omable gift that overshadowed even the most generous gift of silver, the great-
est gift imaginable: the sacrifice of Christ for their sins. The initial gift of a
silver communion vessel was only the first link in a lengthy chain of meaning.
These were objects that sat squarely at the intersection of the community's
metaphysical and social realities (figure 28).
Discussion
Much of the discussion following Gretchen Townsend's presentation cen-
tered upon exactly who the donor intended as the recipient of the gift. It was
noted that the donor at the time of the gift was dead. What could the donor
then receive in return? Haven't donors at death reached a point where there is
nothing to be exchanged? It was suggested that perhaps these gifts were given
not to God but to the church itself, with church meaning the religious commu-
nity living and dead. In this case these were gifts for the living community that
may have represented the salvation of the donor in order to encourage the liv-
ing. The fact that the vessel was saved presents an interesting metaphor for the
donor's being saved. The gift then would be a communication from a member
of the community of saints to the living "saints" to aid the general salvation of
the community. These gifts would embody generational concerns.
Another suggestion focused upon church silver gifts as objects intended to
build the community. Extending this idea to other areas of American gift ex-
change, it was observed that American philanthropy also was concerned with
building. This concern may have been attributable to the persistent frontier-
52
h
,.'
n
y
f
,f
e
l

Figure 28. Silver beakers, c. 1713- 88, First Church, Hatfield, Massachusetts. ( The Mabel Brady Garvan Collection, Yale Uni-
versity Art Gallery. Photograph from Yale University Art Gallery.)

like qualities of many American institutions, but, whatever the cause, a gift
given to build something contrasts with the type of gift exchange practiced in
Indonesia.

Conclusion and Questions In a closing session designed to review the major ideas and questions generated
for Further Study by discussion during the seminar, Jules Prown and Howard Lamar of Yale and
William Sturtevant and Paul Michael Taylor of the Smithsonian catalogued the
recurring themes expressed over the two days of the conference. All of the dis-
cussants emphasized the importance of objects, material culture, as essential to
deepen the study of culture and social relations in both "archaic" and "mod-
ern" societies. As Howard Lamar stated, the word "gift" seems to m ean every-
thing. Jules Prown catalogued some of the gifts and gift-giving occasions dis-
cussed during the seminar and noted that the range of gift behavior was
extraordinarily broad. Gifts both maintain the status quo and challenge it; they
relate to pleasant occasions in which honors and trophies are bestowed as well
as to more perilous ones. Citing the most famous of dangerous gifts, the Trojan
Horse, Prown suggested that, as preserved in aphorism, "beware Greeks bear-
ing gifts," the potentially unsettling nature of gift had become a part of our lin-
guistic and ideological notions. The discussants called for an investigation of
the linguistic patterns of gift and the role of speech and language in gift and gift
exchan ge.
William Sturtevant extended Prown's catalogue of gifts and gift occasions to
everyday life by asking us to consider whether words like payment, fine, wages,

53
 salary, tributes, tithing, alms, honorarium, sacrifice, and finally museum collec-
tion might all involve aspects of the gift. He called for studies that focus upon
the performance aspect of exchange that might reveal the mental constructs
that identify and separate gift from what superficially might seem to be gift be-
havior. Paul Taylor, building on Sturtevant's comments, called for research that
would distinguish between types of gifts and systems of exchange. Noting that
when we participate as gift givers we unify ourselves in artificially constructed
groups, he called specifically for m ore studies that consider the role of women
in exchange and as the creators of certain kinds of groups and social interac-
tions. He suggested that research that stressed legal studies or the cataloging of
normative behaviors might disentangle the gift from loan and from other cate-
gories of exchange.
Finally, sounding a humanistic note at the close of the session, Howard
Lamar stated that no m atter what the particulars of the research, gift and gift
exchange were intimately tied to how we as humans relate to one another. No
m atter what we as participants discussed, we were all fundamentally discussing
the production of ritual, survival, and power in an effort to understand how
the human race works.

Invited Participants Jean-Christophe Agnew Abbott Lowell Cummings

Associate Professor Robert F. Montgomery Professor of
History and American Studies American Decorative Arts, Emeritus
Yale University History of Art Department
Box 1504A Yale University
203-432-1188 Box 2009
203-432-2689
Richard Ahlborn
Curator of Community Life Wilton S. Dillon
National Museum of American Senior Scholar in Residence and
History Director of Interdisciplinary Studies
Smithsonian Institution Smithsonian Institution
202-357-2385 Building Tsso
202-786-2358
Tonnia Anderson
Graduate Student Richard G. Doty
African-American Studies Curator, National Numismatic
Yale University Collection
100 York Street National Museum of American
New Haven, Connecticut 06511 History
Smithsonian Institution
Lorraine V. Aragon 202-357-1798
Departm ent of Anthropology and
Sociology Alan Fern
East Carolina University Director
Greenville, NC 27858 Nation al Portrait Gallery
919-328-6883 Smithsonian Institution
202-357-1915
Mary Jo Arnoldi
Associate Curator William Fitzhugh
Departm ent of Anthropology Director, Artie Studies Program Center
National Museum of Natural History and Curator
Smithsonian Institution Nation al Museum of Natural History
202-357-1396 Smithsonian Institution
202-357-2682

54
John A. Fleckner Steven Lubar
Chief Archivist Curator, National Museum of
National Museum of American American History
History Smithsonian Institution
Smithsonian Institution 202-357-3188
Room C340
202-357-3270 George Miles
The Beinecke Rare Book and
Cory Gillilland Manuscript Library
Curator, National Numismatic Yale University
Collection Box 1603A
National Museum of American 203-432-2958
History
Smithsonian Institution Maria Montoya
202-357-1800 Graduate Student
Department of History
Roy Hamilton Yale University
Visiting Curator Box 1504A
Fowler Museum of Cultural History
University of California, AlixaNaff
Los Angeles Arab-American Collection
405 Hilgard Avenue National Museum of American
Los Angeles, California 90024 History
310-206-7002 Smithsonian Institution
202-357-3270
RobertS. Hoffmann
Assistant Secretary for Research Cynthia Ott
Smithsonian Institution Department of History
Building 120 Yale University
202-357-2939 Box 1504A

Sally Hoffmann Lucia Buchanan Pierce

Exhibition Development Education
Traveling Exhibition Service Freer-Sackler Galleries
Smithsonian Institution Smithsonian Institution
202-786-2241 202-786-2087

Cynthia Adams Hoover Leopold PospiSil

Cur.ator, Division of Musical History Professor, Department of
Natwnal Museum of American Anthropology
History Yale University
Smithsonian Institution Box 2114
202-357-1707 Jules D. Prown
Helen Ibbitson Jessup Paul Mellon Professor
Guest Curator and Project Director History of Art
The Asia Society Yale University
3415 0 Street, N.W. Box 20009
Washington, D.C. 20007 203-432-2685
202-342-2131 Annamarie L. Rice
Pieter ter Keurs (former) Research Assistant
National Museum of Ethnology Asian Cultural History Program
P.O. Box 212 Department of Anthopology
Leiden, Holland 2300AE Smithsonian Institution
202-357-4730
Howard Lamar
William Robertson Coe Professor of Fatimah Tobing Rony
American History, Emeritus Graduate Student
Yale University History of Art Department
Box 1507A Yale University
203-432-1371 203-432-2667

55
 Ainlay Samuels Patricia Thatcher
History of Art Department Graduate Student
Yale University University of Delaware
212-420-0040 302-738-5137
Anthony Seeger Gretchen Townsend
Curator, Office of Folklife Programs Graduate Student
Smithsonian Institution American Studies
202-287-3261 Department of American Art
Ruth Osterweis Selig Yale University Art Gallery
Office of the Assistant Secretary for New Haven, Connecticut 06520
Research Candace Waid
Smithsonian Institution Associate Professor
Building 120 English Department
202-357-2939 Yale University
James Sexton BOX3545
Graduate Student 203-789-8538
Yale University Karen Wright
203-782-2639 Graduate Student
William Sturtevant Yale University
Curator, Department 203-498-0259
of Anthropology
National Museum of Natural History
Smithsonian Institution
202-357-1395
Paul Michael Taylor
Director, Asian Cultural History
Program and Curator
Department of Anthropology
National Museum of Natural History
Smithsonian Institution
202-357-4730

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59
Yale-Smithsonian Reports on Material Culture
ISSN 1080-0530

The Gift as Material Culture

The essays in this report were prepared for the fourth annual Yale-Smithsonian
Seminar on Material Culture, held in Washington, D.C., in April1991. Repre-
senting a broad range of academic disciplines, seminar participants examined
gifts as objects of material culture. Their presentations have been revised for
publication here, along with summaries of the ensuing discussions and illus-
trations of some of the objects discussed. They are grouped into three major
themes of the seminar: wedding gifts and marital alliances, gifts in economic
perspective, and the use of gifts to negotiate political power or to seek religious
propitiation.
The Yale-Smithsonian Seminar on Material Culture brings together scholars
from both institutions who use multi-disciplinary approaches in the study of
material culture. These reports are intended to stimulate thoughtful discussion
and to raise further questions that might encourage future research. Reports of
these seminars are available from the Yale Center for the Study of American Art
and Material Culture. Those published include:
No.1. Nineteenth-Century American Silver
No. 2. Crossroads of Continents: The Material Culture of Siberia and Alaska
No. J. The Impact of New Netherlands upon the Colonial Long Island Basin
Reports in preparation are No. s. Weapons in American Culture, No. 6. Maps
as Material Culture, and No. J. Wood: Timber, Transformations, and Design.