ABSTRACT
This chapter focuses on a particular kind of human cooperation: that entailed in putting on rituals. Under the framework of patrilineal-cum-Confucian ideologies, the scale and complexity of Chinese funerary rituals is meant to vary according to the status of the dead. The funerals of aged people are considered ‘white happy events’ that should entail elaborate rituals, a very large audience and banquets to thank the helpers and attendees, which together require a great cash outlay by ordinary households. This kind of expensive and elaborate funeral is prevalent in contemporary Jinmen (a group of islands under Taiwan’s governance), especially in the patrilineal villages, where a patrilineal kinship group dominates most of a village’s population. Cooperation between the kin helpers is essential to a successful funeral. For the cooperation between non-kin, people may be merely motivated by their guanxi of various kinds, but very often there is an emphasis on mutual sentiments, reciprocity or instrumental considerations depending on the particular situations.
