Money, Money, Money: Gift Exchange and Credit Giving in Coastal Kerala

Abstract

For Kerala’s Latin Catholics, financial expenses related to life-cycle events like weddings, baptisms, funerals, and paying for children’s education or for medical treatment are customary expenditures. Yet, many Malayali Latin Catholics in the coastal region are craftsmen and fishermen, and their incomes tend to be unsteady. When they cannot afford these costs using their own resources, borrowing money and accruing debt is a common solution. Besides loans from banks and other institutions, credit is given among relatives, friends, neighbors, and acquaintances. This type of credit is known as kaṭaṁ (“debt”). The article argues that kaṭaṁ can be interpreted as a kind of gift exchange, since it is inseparable from the people involved and the (kind of) relationship that exists between them. Interdependence is the necessary basis of kaṭaṁ, and like gift exchange, credit giving among relatives and friends serves to confirm and strengthen existing relationships.