lessons of potlatch

Still raining, three days running. How lucky we are, even if the rain is intermittent. How good and comforting it is to hear the rain fall on the roof; white noise at night, without the aid of a machine!

I was reminded of the Northwest Indians potlatch ceremony today, during a conversation of the culture of gifts and gift-giving (more of that and its influence on our buying urges later).

To celebrate various lifecycle events, and to mark one's place and status in society, the American Northwest Coast Indians celebrated potlatch ceremonies. Grand amounts of people would be invited from neighboring and sometimes distant areas. Lasting often several days, the ceremony would be led by a host who would lavish food and gifts of blankets, baskets, copper and baubles of all sorts on the guests.

Some anthropologists suggest that these ceremonies served not only the purpose of aggrandizing the host and establishing relationships between grantor and recipient, but they also served to redistribute wealth that had accumulated in one person's domain. It seems that in that culture, undue accumulation of wealth was not smiled upon, and so a folk ritual was developed to serve as a practical corrective.

While the owner gave up (that is, reduced much of) his wealth at these ceremonies, he also gained standing and status. Indeed, it seems this may have been the only way his money truly served him. Evidently, possessing wealth did not promote standing. Giving it away did!

Imagine if our wealth and possessions had value only as a prelude to distribution and gifting - what would the world, our consumer patterns, the environment, and our community's social health look like today?