The Kula ring is a ceremonial exchange system spanning 18 island communities of the Massim archipelago in Milne Bay Province, Papua New Guinea, including the Trobriand Islands, involving thousands of participants. Two classes of non-utilitarian valuables circulate in fixed, opposite directions around the ring: red shell-disc necklaces (soulava) travel clockwise and white shell armbands (mwali) travel counterclockwise, exchanged between long-term ceremonial trading partners. Even brief possession of a valuable confers prestige and status, and the exchanges are bound up with political authority, courage, and elaborate magic and ceremony. Bronisław Malinowski documented the system in his 1922 ethnography Argonauts of the Western Pacific, an observation that became foundational to anthropological gift-exchange theory, later built on by Marcel Mauss. This description is adapted from Wikipedia contributors under CC BY-SA 4.0; changes were made. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/
Facts
Typical RegionSourced to the subject's own accountThe Massim archipelago, Milne Bay Province, Papua New Guinea, including the Trobriand Islands specifically. 1 Documented YearSourced to the subject's own accountPublication year of Malinowski's Argonauts of the Western Pacific, based on fieldwork conducted roughly 1915-1918. Connections
Associated With
Source Wikipedia: Gift Economy
Malinowski distinguished gimwali, ordinary barter, from the ceremonial Kula ring exchange as two parallel economic systems operating side by side in Trobriand society.
Studied By
Source Wikipedia: Kula Ring
In the Other Atlases
Originated In
Also in Geography Atlas: where this subject originated.
Source Wikipedia: Kula Ringopening definition and description sectionstier 3Quote, opening definition and description sections
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.
Sources
1. Wikipedia: Kula Ring
Wikipediaopening definition and description sections
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.
opening section
The Kula ring was made famous by Bronisław Malinowski, who is considered as the father of modern anthropology, who used the test case to argue for the universality of rational decision-making and for the cultural nature of the object of their effort.
opening definition
Participants travel at times hundreds of miles by canoe to exchange Kula valuables, which consist of red shell-disc necklaces (veigun or soulava) that are traded to the north (circling the ring in clockwise direction) and white shell armbands (mwali) that are traded in the southern direction (circling counterclockwise).
term itself
His seminal work on the topic, Argonauts of the Western Pacific (1922), 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?"
- Studied By: Bronislaw Malinowski, opening section, citing Argonauts of the Western Pacific (1922)
View the Source Wikipedia: Gift Economy
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