ABSTRACT
This chapter shows that the significance of M. Strathern's study of Hagen migrants' uses of money can be revealed by re-posing her questions for another example of the new forms of plastic money that abounded in the 1990s. It highlights the moral qualities of investment as it creates obligations; experienced largely as debt and credit, or simply responsibility to kin. A core claim of C. Gregory’s argument is pertinent to understanding the intellectual and social contexts of Strathern’s monograph. New money as an anthropological subject needs a new kind of comparative attention after the demise of the gold standard. Contemporary with the rise of new national currencies around the world, citizens of the North Atlantic societies of Western Europe and North America began to use credit cards, a new a financial device in order to conduct personal financial business.
