Ceremonial exchange system in the Milne Bay Province of Papua New Guinea
Part of a series on
Economic, applied, and development anthropology
Basic concepts
Commodification
Barter
Debt
Finance
Embeddedness
Reciprocity
Redistribution
Value
Wealth
Gift economy
Limited good
Inalienable possessions
Singularization (commodity pathway)
Spheres of exchange
Social capital
Cultural capital
Provisioning systems
Hunting-gathering
Pastoralism
Nomadic pastoralism
Shifting cultivation
Moral economy
Peasant economics
Case studies
Prestations
Kula ring
Moka exchange
Potlatch
Gifting
Gifting remittances
Organ gifting
Shell money
Provisioning
Aché people (hunter-gatherers)
Batek people
Colonialism and development
The Anti-Politics Machine
Europe and the People Without History
Political economy
Jim Crow economy
Related articles
Critique of political economy
Original affluent society
Formalist–substantivist debate
The Great Transformation
Peasant economics
Culture of poverty
Political economy
State formation
Nutritional anthropology
Heritage commodification
Anthropology of development
Major theorists
Paul Bohannan
Alexander Chayanov
Stanley Diamond
Raymond Firth
Maurice Godelier
David Graeber
Jane I. Guyer
Keith Hart
Marvin Harris
Bronisław Malinowski
Marcel Mauss
Sidney Mintz
Karl Polanyi
Marshall Sahlins
Harold K. Schneider
Eric Wolf
Social and cultural anthropology
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Kula, also known as the Kula exchange or Kula ring, is a ceremonial exchange system conducted in the Milne Bay Province of Papua New Guinea. The Kula ring was made famous by Bronisław Malinowski, considered the father of modern anthropology. He used this test case to argue for the universality of rational decision-making and for the cultural nature of the object of their effort. Malinowski's seminal work on the topic, Argonauts of the Western Pacific (1922),[1] directly confronted the question, "Why would men risk life and limb to travel across huge expanses of dangerous ocean to give away what appear to be worthless trinkets?" Malinowski carefully traced the network of exchanges of bracelets and necklaces across the Trobriand Islands, and established that they were part of a system of exchange (the Kula ring), and that this exchange system was clearly linked to political authority.
Malinowski's study became the subject of debate with the French anthropologist, Marcel Mauss, author of The Gift ("Essai sur le don", 1925).[2] Since then, the Kula ring has been central to the continuing anthropological debate on the nature of gift-giving, and the existence of gift economies.
^Malinowski, Bronislaw (1922). Argonauts of the Western Pacific: An Account of Native Enterprise and Adventure in the Archipelagos of Melanesian New Guinea. London: Routledge & Kegan Paul.
^Mauss, Marcel (1970). The Gift: Forms and Functions of Exchange in Archaic Societies. London: Cohen & West.
Kula, also known as the Kula exchange or Kularing, is a ceremonial exchange system conducted in the Milne Bay Province of Papua New Guinea. The Kula...
in Turkey Kula, Manisa, a town in Western Anatolia, Turkey Kula, Hawaii, a district of East Maui in Hawaii, U.S. Kula, Sungurlu Kularing, a ceremonial...
roles. Other examples of this "potlatch type" of gift economy include the Kularing found in the Trobriand Islands.: 188–208 Competitive altruism Conspicuous...
Bronisław Malinowski's description of the Kularing in the Trobriand Islands during World War I. The Kula trade appeared to be gift-like since Trobrianders...
mortuary sequences and complex systems of ritual exchange including the Kularing. From island group to island group and even between close lying islands...
Malinowski established that they were part of a system of exchange, the Kularing. He stated that this exchange system was clearly linked to political authority...
there has been little need for a currency-based economy outside of the Kularings. To counteract this lack of hard currency, several western goods stores...
Trees, Knots, and Outriggers: Environmental Knowledge in the Northeast KulaRing. Berghahn Books. pp. 180–246. ISBN 9781785332333. Mabberley, D.J. (1997)...
In parts of West Asia, Cypraea annulus, the ring cowry, so-called because of the bright orange-colored ring on the back or upper side of the shell, was...
exchange. She also applies the concept to explain examples such as the Kularing in the Trobriand Islands, which was made famous by Bronisław Malinowski...
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