Symbolic Exchange Research Articles

Lessons from Witchetty Grubs and Eskimos

This paper investigates the French anthropological context of the work of Jean Baudrillard. The religious anthropological though of Émile Durkheim, Marcel Mauss and Georges Bataille is considered. This context is vital to the understanding of Baudrillard's oeuvre. Analysis is given to Mauss's work on the seasonal variations of the Eskimo and the prayers of the Witchetty Grub clan. Two core ideas emerge: the decline of the religious and thereby the social, and the decline of alternation in social life. Durkheim and Bataille clarify these ideas with the notion that the social bond is in decline and that there is a loss of intimacy. Baudrillard's reading and response to this anthropology is to be discovered in his key notions of symbolic exchange, reversibility, and antagonism.

The Past and Present of African Islam

AbstractAmong Muslims across the African continent, there is a noticeable turn towards greater compliance with globalizing norms of Islamic behaviour. Beginning from this widespread observation, this article interrogates the changes that lie concealed under the veil of homogeneity. It identifies a complex pattern of identity formation and power politics, cultural conservativism, marginalized syncretism and symbolic exchange. The emergence of a public sphere has propelled the production of Muslim identity formation in the service of established elites and youth searching for an authentic approach towards Islam. But a turn to Islam also takes a conservative and isolationist turn that thrives in the context of the failure of modern schooling and economy, and provides a haven of dignified marginalization around the great cultures of the past. A syncretist approach to Islam and African cultures is pushed to the background. But there is reason to believe that such an approach thrives on the margins of the society. A global politics of identity and globalization provide the context for a continued exchange of Islamic symbols among Africans in general. The politics of resistance is accompanied by the politics of identity and global conflicts.

Stepmothering and Identity

This paper examines my relationship with my stepdaughter and focuses on how stepmothering is an identity that is co-constructed through language and communication. There is little research that considers the relationship between the stepmother and her stepchild as it is experienced and negotiated by the two of them. Drawing on symbolic interactionism, which posits that the primary task of life is to create relationships with others through the exchange of symbols, here defined as language and communication, this auto-ethnographical analysis of conversations with my stepdaughter reveals the public and private dimensions of the construction of stepmothering.

O médico e o curador: a pedagogia da dádiva de Valentin no universo da saúde

Este artigo tem por objetivo analisar - tendo como base a experiência de Valentin, curandeiro da periferia de Brasília - as tensões contemporâneas entre o moderno e o tradicional, detectadas no universo de trocas entre o saber da biomedicina e o saber tradicional das comunidades populares sobre saúde, tendo como suporte a teoria da dádiva de Marcel Mauss e das trocas simbólicas de Jean Baudrillard.

Parent–Infant Synchrony

Synchrony—a construct used across multiple fields to denote the temporal relationship between events—has been applied to the study of mother–infant interaction and is suggested here as a framework for the study of interpersonal relationships. Defined as the temporal coordination of micro-level social behavior, parent–infant synchrony is charted in its development across infancy from the initial consolidation of biological rhythms during pregnancy to the emergence of symbolic exchange between parent and child. Synchrony is shown to depend on physiological mechanisms supporting bond formation in mammals—particularly physiological oscillators and neuroendocrine systems such as those involving the hormone oxytocin. Developmental outcomes of the synchrony experience are observed in the domains of self-regulation, symbol use, and the capacity for empathy across childhood and adolescence. Specific disruptions to the parameters of synchrony that may be observed in various pathological conditions, such as prematurity or maternal affective disorder, are detailed. A time-based, micro-analytic behavioral approach to the study of human relationship may offer new insights on intersubjectivity across the lifespan.

The Social Economy of Pliny's Correspondence with Trajan

Though the primary function of Pliny's correspondence with Trajan was the transaction of imperial business, these letters could also serve as vehicles for the self-representation and public image of both correspondents. What made these letters mutually beneficial to Pliny and Trajan is the impression that emerges from them, artfully constructed, of a personal friendship between senator and emperor. Because Pliny and Trajan both benefited from being seen to correspond with one another on intimate terms, their letters can be interpreted as symbolic exchanges in a system in which the demonstration of friendship could serve as an important bearer of social capital.

‘What Edward promises he will perform’: ‘How to do things with words’ in Sense and Sensibility

A recent denigrating essay on Jane Austen1 rehearses charges more or less forgotten in her recent recrudescence as an ironic icon of ‘popular culture’. The tally of points against suggests that if ...

Des usagers sceptiques face aux médicaments génériques : une approche anthropologique

Background Since the enactment of the 2002 legislative measures favoring the prescription of generic drugs, various quantitative studies have shown that approval by prescribers and users has risen in France. Nevertheless, scepticism remains as well as distrust towards these drugs focusing on their effectiveness compared with brand-name drugs, on potential dangers, and on the interruption they cause in prescription and consumption habits. Using a comprehensive approach, this article analyzes the social and cultural logic behind the negative image of generic drugs. Methods The materials issued from an ethnographic study on the prescription of drugs for high blood pressure. Sixty-eight interviews were undertaken between April 2002 and October 2004 with people (39 women and 29 men, between the age of 40 and 95, 52 over the age of 60) treated for over a year for high blood pressure in rural areas in the Southeast of France. Thirteen people provided unsolicited opinions about generic drugs. Results Analysis of the information collected shows that users have various representations of generic drugs, including the idea of counterfeited and foreign drugs. These representations interfere with the adjustment process and the development of consumer loyalty. They are part of a set of social representations about drugs which form and express the user's reality. In these representations, the drug is an ambivalent object, carrier of both biological effectiveness and toxicity; it is also the metonymical extension of the prescriber, bestowing upon the prescription a symbolic value. Conclusion By placing the generic drug in its network of symbolic and social meaning, this study highlights the coherence of the scepticism towards generic drugs by consumers (and prescribers) with a system of common opinion in which drugs are everyday things, personalized and compatible with users, symbolic exchange carriers in the physician-patient relationship, and in which confidence in the drug is also that given to the health care system in general.

Guest Editors? Words

Failure and success: One cannot come to be without the other; one comes to be always by becoming the other. Inasmuch as failure constitutes the internal horizon of success, a success is always haunted by the coming of failure, whose arrival never fails to (re-)open the possibility of an immanent reversal. In fact as well as in principle, failure cannot exist without success, and success does not fail to bring with it what will ruin it, for each unsettles itself in turn only to become an other, its own other. Indeed, nothing succeeds like a failure and nothing begins to fail if it were not successful. Failure transitions into success, one is (in) the other, one succeeds the other, and vice versa. What can be said about failure and communication? Perhaps not much; words fail. To bring up, or to return to, the topic of failure in communication does not imply that the structure of symbolic exchange harbors somewhere within it the ideal of success, as though a message sent could potentially, at some other moment, be fully received. Whatever we may think, not all can be communicated. There must be a limit to communication that functions simultaneously, and paradoxically, as a permit for its possibility. This limit is by no means a mystical negativity. Rather, it is the difference between what can be expressed and what remains inexpressible—the distance that succeeds all that has been said. The difference between a word, say, and whatever it might mean, presents an inaugural moment, a kind of opening that calls for something to be said. Yet, though one may choose one’s words freely, the subject that is spoken is never the same as the person who begins to speak. This is why human communication is always a matter of recognition, of ‘‘finding a voice’’ the moment one attempts to express oneself in relation to an other. In this sense, as most of us are aware, communication is more often than not miscommunication; it proceeds always against the possibility of failure, a failure to say exactly what one means and to mean exactly what one says. This failure of communication succeeds, or rather overcomes its own failure, by allowing one to express oneself in the first place. In this special issue, we gather together four articles that address the theme of failure and success as it bears upon issues critical to communication and media theory. These articles discuss in turn philosophy of the first person (Vincent Descombes), digital reproduction of sound (Greg Hainge), theories of spectatorship Communication Theory ISSN 1050-3293

The Political and Symbolic Economy of State Feudalism: The Case of Late-Medieval Flanders

AbstractThe article examines social, economic, political and symbolic relations and exchanges within late-medieval state structure, with a specific focus on the fifteenth-century county of Flanders under Burgundian rule. The author applies and elaborates Jean-Philippe Genet's concept of 'state feudalism' as a more centralised, political articulation of the feudal mode of production, in which state taxes and the redistribution of surplus-product among the ruling classes play a key role. What historians have come to call the 'modern state' arose within a social and political system which influenced in its turn the further development of the state as a network of relationships. Making use of Pierre Bourdieu's concepts of 'capital' and 'symbolic exchange', the article constructs a model representing the different relations between the prince, his officials and 'political society'.

Compromis, régulation et bien commun

English The concept of compromise refers to a symbolic exchange organizing the mutual relationships of parties while recognizing their otherness. It facilitates bringing individual perspectives together, without fusing viewpoints. Thus compromise permits the emergence of an intersubjective organization of the real, while defining the context of that emergence. In this sense, it is at once the creator and the regulator of social reality. The example of a Catholic chaplaincy illustrates the common good that can emerge from a situation of pluralism regulated by compromise. Reflection on the process of the Lebanese civil war shows us that a weak founding compromise leads to a transformation of the common good, headed towards social deconstruction. French Le concept de compromis renvoie à un échange symbolique organisant les rapports mutuels des parties tout en reconnaissant leur altérité. Il permet de lier ensemble des perspectives individuelles, sans fusion des points de vue. Le compromis permet donc l'émergence d'une organisation intersubjective du réel, tout en définissant le cadre de cette émergence. En ce sens, il est à la fois créateur et régulateur de réalité sociale. L'exemple d'une aumônerie catholique illustre le bien commun qui peut émerger d'une situation de pluralisme régulé par un compromis. Une réflexion sur le processus de guerre au Liban montre qu'un compromis fondateur défaillant conduit à une transformation du bien commun tournée vers la déstructuration sociale.

The Strength of Weekly Ties: Relations of Material and Symbolic Exchange in the Conservative Movement

The current Republican ascendancy in American government has generated considerable scholarly interest in the conservative movement. Through an ethno-graphic study of the widely publicized but seldom-observed “Wednesday meeting” of conservative activists, this article inquires into the bases of the conservative movement’s internal cohesion and successful management of alliances with state officials. I argue that the meeting functions as both an instrument of material power and a ritual of symbolic maintenance by establishing relations of reciprocal exchange and sustaining a moral community of conservative activists and their allies. More broadly, the article examines the mutual conditioning and genetic linkage of two dimensions of social reality: relations of force and relations of meaning.

Simulation and Symbolic Exchange: Jean Baudrillard’s Augmentation of Marx’s Theory of Value

Jean Baudrillard’s concept of “symbolic exchange” represents an important concept in understanding why Marx’s prediction regarding the collapse of capitalism has not been realized. Baudrillard adds to the Marxian concepts of use value and exchange value, suggesting that, in today’s consumer‐oriented society, commodities take on a symbolic value that constitutes their “status” and, therefore, power. In the Western industrial societies that are “networked” into information cultures, the generation of symbolic value results from a constantly changing symbolic environment in which new demands for access to symbolic status are generated. Baudrillard sees the United States as the farthest along on the path to a simulated environment of symbolic exchange. Manufacturing for symbolic exchange is directed toward the production of the fetish: an object that is positioned purely for its symbolic value. By directing production increasingly in the direction of the fetish, as an object to be used in symbolic exchange, capitalism is able to sustain itself even after the material needs of the population are satisfied.

REFLEXÕES SOBRE A UTILIZAÇÃO DE ESPAÇOS PÚBLICOS PARA O LAZER ESPORTIVO

Conhecer o esporte feito na cidade implica necessariamente numa análise do espaço geográfico onde esta prática se realiza. Neste sentido, este trabalho buscou conhecer como os espaços de lazer esportivo estão configurados na literatura. Para isto, foram analisadas três expressões espaciais do lazer na cidade: a praça, o parque e a escola pública. A distinção apresentada pela literatura, principalmente aquela referente à arquitetura e ao urbanismo, não é suficiente para a demarcação dos espaços públicos destinados aolazer na perspectiva esportiva. As características morfológicas e funcionais dos espaços não auxiliam a demarcação desta modalidade de lazer.

"Something Rogue": Commensurability, Commodification, Crime, and Justice in Toni Morrison's Later Fiction

Drawing on Beloved, Jazz, and Paradise, and offering a close reading of Love, this essay explores how Toni Morrison's later fiction interrogates conceptions of justice that rely on a logic of commensurability (i.e., punishment equal to the crime, redress adequate to the injury, and benefit corresponding to the desert). Commensurability-based notions of justice risk replicating slavery's logic of commodification, Morrison's fiction suggests, by reifying both victims and perpetrators as abstract categories, placeholders in a symbolic exchange, or fungible elements of an equation.

Imaginando la solidaridad

Our aim is, basically, to try to trouble this notion of solidarity that is launched as obvious, non-criticisable, politically correct, massive, positive, transparent, good, aesthetic... We would be able to add other attributes, but they are enough to characterize a specific and useful kind of solidarity, a present society?s tendency, a sort of symbolic exchange established over asymmetric and unequal relations and, also reproductive of the system where they take place.

Imaginando la solidaridad

Our aim is, basically, to try to trouble this notion of solidarity that is launched as obvious, non-criticisable, politically correct, massive, positive, transparent, good, aesthetic... We would be able to add other attributes, but they are enough to characterize a specific and useful kind of solidarity, a present society?s tendency, a sort of symbolic exchange established over asymmetric and unequal relations and, also reproductive of the system where they take place.

Paying the fool: Rotrou and the economics of entertainment

This article addresses the ways in which laughter, comedy and entertainment are thematized within the comedies and tragicomedies of the early seventeenth-century dramatist Jean de Rotrou. In particular, it demonstrates how Rotrou frequently portrays laughter as being implicated within complex networks of literal and symbolic exchange – networks that mirror, to some extent at least, the wider transactions that underpin the theatre as an institution. For professional or semi-professional entertainers such as the parasite Ergazile in Les Captifs and the jester Fabrice in La Bague de l’oubli, comedy is a commodity that can be traded for financial (or other) profit. Despite these characters’ best efforts, however, comedy stubbornly refuses to obey straightforward models of exchange, and indeed Rotrou’s entertainer figures are repeatedly shown to fail in their professional capacities (their very failure to make others laugh itself providing a further, ironic source of comic entertainment for Rotrou’s literal au...

Os mídia como espaço de troca simbólia: a informação como narrativa

This paper has the purpose of reflecting on the information statute that goes on the mass media, taking into account the hypotheses that these information production meaning at the moment they materialize themselves as narratives establishing themselves as objects that come from symbolic exchanges. In other words, a mechanism of offer and demand that occurs in a indirect way. The base of this thought is the concept of symbolic exchange conceived by Levi-Strauss, to whom human beings set up themselves as cultural beings because they establish interrelations when they communicate with each other through exchanges that can only be understood having in mind the metaphoric-symbolic process and not through direct communication, through things in itself. So this paper tries to ponder the question of exchange which is in the current mass media scenery having in mind the theoretical discussions that come from the area of the sciences of language.

Daughters or dowries? The changing nature of dowry practices in south India

Significant changes have occurred in the practice of dowry in south India. From being an upper caste/class practice, dowry has become an all caste/class phenomenon, replacing the symbolic exchange of gifts between families of the groom and the bride. It has become a euphemism for strategies to acquire higher standards of material life, status, and security, with negative consequences to women’s status, including their survival. The antifemale bias of the practice cannot be tackled from within the dowry trap. Raising the critical consciousness of women about their identity and self-esteem remains a critical component of effective strategies.