Dissertation > Excellent graduate degree dissertation topics show

Rites and Gift Lists: Reciprocity in Farmer’s Gift-giving

Author: DiQingJu
Tutor: ZhangWenMing
School: East China Normal University
Course: Sociology
Keywords: farmer’s gift-giving gift lists rites renqing relationship reciprocity
CLC: C912.82
Type: Master's thesis
Year: 2011
Downloads: 329
Quote: 0
Read: Download Dissertation

Abstract


As general sense of social action, gifts and its corresponding ritual behavior have been gained comprehensive as well as sustained attention in sociology, anthropology, folklore and some others disciplines. Especially, as one of the important parts of rural daily life, farmers’gift-giving has engaged a large number of both domestic and abroad scholars’ attention and interest.From the existing studies of gifts and gift-giving, we can find that researchers tend to choose some developed cities or underdeveloped rural areas to mainly study renqing consumption, social network construction, but rarely focus on the gifts-giving and its inherent principle of reciprocity of farmers from the metropolitan outskirts.This paper is based on a case study of one suburban village in Shanghai, to describe there rites of passage such as marriage ceremony, fertility rites, and funeral rites through careful analysis of some gift lists, focusing on the difference of participants and their gift-giving among the three ceremonial occasions to show the whole family social network and grip the inherent principle of reciprocity in the behavior of gift-giving, in pursuit of responding the existing research and making up the blank.For the above reasons, this study will be divided into six parts. Introduction clarifies the research background, research methods, and a brief account of the object village. Chapter One starts from Chinese traditional rites culture, review domestic and abroad gift research. Chapter Two introduces the major occasions of gift-giving in village N, presents the changes of gift-giving in three passage rites. Chapter Three respectively analyzes three gift lists of marriage ceremony, fertility rites and funeral rites of one village family, presents the family’s network construction, and makes a comparison among the three different occasions; and then starts from four wedding gift lists of four families to concentrate on people’s gift-giving and relationship in the occasion of wedding. Chapter Four is based on a village family’s wedding gift list and gifts-giving expenses to explore the obligations of giving and reciprocating, proposes a new-type principle of reciprocity, which gathers not only renqing but also rationality. Conclusion will be in response to several studies on gifts and gift-giving; finally, states the viewpoint that there are no fundamental changes in farmers’gift-giving, and farmers in the metropolitan outskirts have not been influenced by the urban civilization deep into the level of culture and value, so the inertia of Chinese traditional culture and native culture still play an significant role in farmers’daily life.

Related Dissertations

  1. Diqing Tibetan areas of funeral rites and soul Worship,K892.22
  2. Study of Yimeng’s Funeral Culture,K892.4
  3. The Research on Yue Ling Thought in Han Dynasty,K234
  4. Researches on Mechanism of SLF and ELF Wave Propagation in an Anisotropic Earth-Ionosphere Cavity,TN011.2
  5. Trust game and its Results and discussion,F224.32
  6. To the inner of the ceremony by the external rites,B222.5
  7. Compensation of Channel Non-Reciprocity in TDD MIMO Systems,TN919.3
  8. The Initial Analysis of Architectural Creative Conception Based on "Non-Linear Theory",TU-05
  9. The Discussion and Analysis of Confucian Ritualism,B222
  10. Study on the Epigraph of Chenchen He,K877
  11. Fujian and the Self-interpretation of Eastern Spanish Visitor,K248
  12. Traditional Ritual’s Changes in Modern Times,K892.3
  13. "Explanation Attached to Each Note a Little Rhyme Ministry of Rites" Multi-character Study of Sound,H131
  14. The Electromagnetic Field of the Underground SLF/ELF Horizontal Electric Dipole Located in the Isotropical Earth-ionosphere Wave Guide,TN814
  15. Ritual and Legal Thoughts of Xun Zi Reserch,B222.6
  16. The Religion of Taoism Art in Agrestic Funeral in the Region of Yuan Xiang Studies,J209.2
  17. Discussion on the Difficulties and Methods for English Translation of Traditional Chinese Medicine,H315.9
  18. The Study on Development of Rural Consumer Credit in Guizhou Province,F832.4
  19. The Centennial Research Synthesis of Dunhuang Marriage and Funeral Customs,K870.6
  20. The ZhuBin Ceremonies from the Academic Inheritance of Training Bun,K248
  21. Proofing the Ce Fu Yuan Gui · palm Board of Rites \,K206

CLC: > Social Sciences > Sociology > Social structure and social relations > Areas of sociology > Rural Sociology
© 2012 www.DissertationTopic.Net  Mobile