By Erin Cox
When attending an important celebration in today’s society, like a birth or a marriage, it is the guest who brings a gift to show their happiness for the occasion. But for the Kwakwaka’wakw people, the opposite is true. “When one’s heart is glad, he gives away gifts. Our creator gave it to us, to be our way of doing things, to be our way of rejoicing, we who are Indian. The Potlatch was given to us to be our way of expressing joy” – Agnes Alfred of Albert Bay (1980).
A potlatch is a ceremony intrinsic to the social and spiritual community of the Kwakwaka’wakw located in British Colombia. These ceremonies are thrown for all important celebrations of their community. The main purpose of a potlatch is the redistribution and reciprocity of wealth, but it is also used to show generosity and uphold the host’s status in society. Elaborate and theatrical dances are performed to reflect the host’s genealogy and cultural wealth. The host invests a large amount of time and money into a potlatch; they provide all the food and gifts and the more elaborate the celebration, the more esteem a host earns. Often, tribe nobles will try to outdo each other with the lavishness of their potlatch celebrations, having larger quantities of food and giving away more expensive gifts. This type of competition is directly responsible for the social standing and ranking system in their society. In the Kwakwaka’wakw culture material items are used to represent spiritual wealth. A noble can directly trace his routes back to a tribe’s supernatural founding member. By participating in a gift exchange the noble shows himself to be a ‘worthy vehicle’ for the soul of his ancestor.
In Western society, status is often shown with expensive cars and designer clothes: the more money you have, the more status you gain. This concept is similar but at the same time vastly different for the Native American. Status and social standing is related to wealth and material possessions but this status is gained by being the one who gives away the wealthiest gifts. The person with the highest status and social standing in their culture is the person most closely linked to the cosmos. The cosmos is the circulation of lives and live forces, by giving gifts in a ritual nature they are negotiating with the cosmos for life to return to the land and the sea to make their people more prosperous.
Potlatch ceremonies may not immediately be linked to philanthropy but the giving of gifts during the ceremony and the gaining and maintaining of social status is all for the purpose of becoming more closely linked to the cosmos. In turn, the ritual giving honours to the cosmos causes the land and sea to become fertile and full of life which benefits the entire tribe with fruitful harvests and successful hunting. Thus the entire tribe becomes more prosperous and can give away wealthier gifts and gain higher spiritual status. It is a very circular tradition that can be seen as self – serving or for the good of the tribe. But either way you view it, the potlatch is a key ritual in preserving and continuing the Native American community, social hierarchy, and spiritual security.
Works Cited
Emuseum Minnesota State University Mankato: http://www.mnsu.ed/emuseum/cultural/northamerica/kwakiati.html
Potlatch: http://www.wikipedia.org/wiki/Potlatch
Comparative Studies in Society & History, Vol 37 no. 1, pp. 41-75, “It is a strict law that bids us Dance: Cosmologies, Colonialism, Death, & Ritual Authority in the Kwakwaka’wakw Potlatch 1849 – 1922” – Joseph Masco
A comparative Study in Native American Philanthropy – John Grim.
