reciprocity anthropology assignment? market exchange?

[ashleyyy]

what is market exchange? im doing a project for my anthropology class but i just don't understand it.

I have to come up with a scenario for how market exchange is manifested in culture today..?

does anyone know what this meansss?

[ashokakirti l]

Market, exchange and reciprocity are the key words for you, and you must know the basic conceptions of these terms. In anthropology, Market differs from Market-place. Market exchange is ‘take goods and give money’ which is determined by forces of supply and demand, it also means commodity exchange, you may like to remember stock exchange. Substantives school gives three types of economy: Reciprocity, Redistribution, and Market Exchange. Market may exist in those societies where reciprocity and redistribution are predominant. You can remember the works of Durkheim and Mauss to understand reciprocity as gift exchange. If I present you a beautiful gift on your birthday, you would like to do same in my birthday. That is called reciprocity exchange. But when I lend you a bit of salt when you were cooking, you will return a bit of salt while I am lacking, that is commodity exchange. When I help you to plant paddy in your farm, you will do same in my turn that is called labor exchange, I give you my sister to you, you may like to return your sister as my bride, this is bride exchange (remember Levi-Strauss). Reciprocity is always reciprocal.

Redistribution in its simplest form is pooling of the goods by producers for common use of the group and its members. If I have produced a garden of mangoes, I would like to redistribute among my kins.

Please read the handbook on economic anthropology by Stuart Plattner and ‘Market and Society’ by Chris Hann and Keith Hart.
Best of Luck!

[scallywag]

One of the important aspects of forms of exchange is "social distance": (generalised) reciprocity is a form of exchange found among people who are social equals (same status) or are close (friends and family). At the other end is market exchange where the value of something is not determined by your personal relationship to the person from whom you get that thing but "the market" (naively considered "supply and demand" but we all know from experience that prices rise until demand declines too far - i.e. "what the market will bear"! -- and supplies are controlled to manipulate demand).

The scenario: in our culture, money is used as a medium of exchange for market exchanges so if you see money being used to complete a transaction then it is likely a market transaction. But if you give money to a charity is that a market exchange? The answer depends on what you expect from the exchange, especially what you expect *socially* (or personally if you prefer). So, say you meet a new friend at a bar or coffee shop and your friend discovers they don't have any money. No problem, you buy your friend a drink/coffee but the question is: do you expect anything in return? If you expect your money the next day then that is a sign that your understanding of the transaction (coffee/drink/favour for money) is shaped by a culture of market exchange *even if the exchange itself was not, strictly speaking, a market exchange*. By not engaging in reciprocity (i.e. no expectation of any return, or at least any immediate return) you have denied the social closeness of friendship and treated the person as merely the recipient of your services for which you should be paid (you could have issued an invoice/IOU). The act of buying a drink/coffee was not a favour to a friend so should be repaid ASAP; without maintaining personal indebtedness to people (people, not institutions like banks) you are not creating the social closeness that would be expected among friends. If friends "should not owe (money)" that's because these are friends in a society/culture dominated by the market principle where transactions are supposed to be impersonal.

update: as an aside, treating the "favour" as a market transaction is a perfectly acceptable/social way of telling the person you are not interested in being close friends.