ABSTRACT
In The Gift, Marcel Mauss proposes that local variants of the Pacific Polynesian and Melanesian concept of mana explain how archaic cultures infuse gifts with religious, spiritual, and magical forces. In addition to the political and legal structures that sustain social relationships built through gift exchange, Mauss identifies a transcendent quality of gifts that motivates people to keep them in circulation. Mauss cites beliefs about almsgiving as a principle of justice and obligation under the threat of divine retribution in Christianity and Islam and among the Hausa of the northeast African nation of Sudan, the ancient Semites and Hindus, and Arab cultures. The spiritual grease for the wheels of exchange furnished by concepts such as mana and hau, as well as their relation to alms, supports Mauss’s principal ideas about the obligatory nature of gift cycles. Mauss argues that rich members of industrialized societies should be reminded of their custodial role vis-a-vis the poor.
