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Negative Reciprocity In American Culture

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With the introduction of currency, cultures began to implement negative-reciprocity into their economic systems and social organizations. Instead of bartering and creating social bonds, people try to get the most out of a trade/social interaction, while giving up the least of their possessions/money. Different cultures have developed means of using negative reciprocity to their benefit. Many societies have used negative reciprocity in their trade and sharing systems to both strengthen and fight existing relationships as well as ward off foreigners. Negative reciprocity is apparent in the fraternal polyandry that is practiced in Tibetan societies of North Nepal. Lee Cronk’s Reciprocity and the Power of Giving and Melvyn C. Goldstein’s Polyandry: When Brothers Take a Wife support the argument that the different …show more content…
The ‘strings’ are the very essence of the trade between Indians and Indians as well as Indians and colonists, and upon learning this, the colonists understood the deeper meaning of trade amongst other cultures. The ‘strings’ in other cultures go further than those of our own. One may use a gift in American culture to establish how much a friendship is worth; this can be done by giving a gift of a certain worth to a friend and seeing what they give in return. If the gift is of anything but equal worth it is understood that the two participants of the exchange view their friendship differently. This simple concept works well within our society, but does not do much more that establish a friendship’s worth. In other cultures, by exploiting negative reciprocity, trading parties can establish much more: such as the end and preservation of a relationship, a rise in status and can even in some cases can be used to resolve a

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