Potlatch In American Indian Culture

The Potlatch is a ceremonial feast held by tribes of Northwest Indians in North America. Members of these tribes would gather and save their possessions for many years, only to then give away or destroy their wealth during the Potlatch ceremony. To those who don’t share the culture of the American Indians, this can be a strange concept to understand; however, there are many benefits to the tradition such as gaining relationships and status and preventing abuse of power.

The goods given away or destroyed at a Potlatch included money, canoes, flour, kettles, dishes, sewing machines, blankets, masks, and coppers. Even slaves were given away, although not destroyed. Some potlatch ceremonies took up to a year to plan, sometimes lasting as long as three weeks. They included a feast, singing, and dancing with costumes and masks. Besides acknowledging elevated status

He believed in objectivity, and was a strong advocate of fieldwork and participant observation. Boas gained an emic perspective by immersing himself in the culture of these people, and became interested in the Potlatch and how it differed from our culture. Our culture is very different from the culture of the American Indians. We live in a society obsessed with conspicuous consumption - the spending of money on luxury goods to publicly display economic power as a means of gaining and maintaining social status. An example of this is the popularity of brands such as Hollister and Jack Wills, and how people will pay excessive sums of money just to wear the logo. However, from the perspective of cultural relativism, we can see some aspects of the Potlatch come into our traditions, such as delayed reciprocity and gift economy. For example, when we invite someone to our birthday party, we expect them to invite us to their birthday party. This would also involve the exchanging of birthday presents of roughly equal