Marcel Mauss

Marcel Mauss (born May 10, 1872 – died February 10, 1950) was a French sociologist best known for his role in elaborating on and securing the legacy of his uncle, Émile Durkheim and the Annee Sociologique. His pioneering work on reciprocity and gift economies in “primitive” cultures make him, considered by many, the father of modern Franch anthropology.

Life

Marcel Mauss was born in 1872 in Epinal, France, into an Orthodox Jewish family. His famous uncle, Emile Durkheim influenced his interest for philosophy, and Mauss entered the University of Bordeaux where Durkheim was a philosophy professor. Mauss studied there under Alfred Espinas and Octave Hamelin. Although he never received a formal degree, in 1895 he became Agrégé de Philosophie, passing teaching exam in philosophy. Instead of taking the usual route of teaching at a lycee, Mauss moved to Paris and took up the study of comparative religion, particularly Sanskrit. From 1897 to 1898 he took a study trip to Oxford, England, where he met Edward Tylor, by many considered the father of anthropology. Mauss’s first publication in 1896 marked the beginning of a prolific career that would produce several landmarks in the sociological literature.

In 1900 Mauss joined the faculty of the École Pratique des Hautes Études at the University of Paris. He took up his first important position as a chair in 'History of religion and uncivilized peoples' in 1902, succeeding famous professor Leon Marillier. It was at this time that he began drawing more and more on ethnography, and his work began increasingly to look like what we would today call anthropology. Mauss continued to teach this course at the University of Paris until 1930, and after 1930 he taught the same course at the College de France.

One thing made Mauss distinctive from other scholars of his time. Unlike others who mostly spent time on theoretical knowledge, Mauss was rather practical and socially active. He was a member of Annee Sociologique, and as such was attracted to socialism, particularly that espoused by Jean Jaures. Mauss was active in the events of the Dreyfus affair - supporting Emile Zola - and towards the end of the century he helped edit such left-wing papers as le Populaire, l'Humanite and le Mouvement Socialiste, the last in collaboration with Georges Sorel. As a scholar Mauss always remained socially active, never losing sight of reality around him.

The years of World War I were absolutely devastating for Mauss. Many of his friends and colleagues died in the war, including Durkheim’s son. Durkheim died of grief shortly thereafter, and Mauss was left practically alone to continue his legacy. The postwar years proved politically difficult for Mauss. Durkheim had previously made changes to school curriculums across France, and after his death a backlash against his students began. Like many other followers of Durkheim, Mauss took refuge in administration, securing Durkheim's legacy by founding institutions such as l'Institut Français de Sociologie in 1924 and l'Institut d'Ethnologie in 1926. In 1931 he took up the chair of Sociology at the College de France. He actively fought against anti-semitism and racial politics both before and after WWII. He died in 1950.

Work

In his classic work The Gift, Mauss argued that gifts are never "free". Rather, human history is full of examples that gifts give rise to reciprocal exchange. The famous question that drove his inquiry into the anthropology of the gift was: "What power resides in the object given that causes its recipient to pay it back?" The answer, according to Mauss, was simple: the gift is a "total prestation", imbued with "spiritual mechanisms", engaging the honor of both giver and receiver (the term "total prestation" or "total social fact" (in French fait social total) was coined by his student Maurice Leenhardt (after Durkheim's social fact). Such transactions transcend the divisions between the spiritual and the material in a way that according to Mauss is almost "magical". The giver does not merely give an object, but also part of himself, for the object is indissolubly tied to the giver: "the objects are never completely separated from the men who exchange them". Because of this bond between giver and gift, the act of giving creates a social bond with an obligation to reciprocate on part of the recipient. To not reciprocate means to lose honor and status, but the spiritual implications can be even worse. In Polynesia, failure to reciprocate means to lose mana, one's spiritual source of authority and wealth. Mauss distinguished between three obligations: giving - the necessary initial step for the creation and maintenance of social relationships; receiving, for to refuse to receive is to reject the social bond; and reciprocating in order to demonstrate one's own liberality, honor and wealth. Mauss's views on sacrifice (see Sacrifice: Its Nature and Functions) also reflect this position, viewing sacrifice as a form of exchange.

An important notion in Mauss' conceptualization of gift exchange is what Gregory (1982, 1997) refers to as "inalienability". In a commodity economy there is a strong distinction between objects and persons through the notion of private property. Objects are sold, meaning that the ownership rights are fully transferred to the new owner. The object has thereby become "alienated" from its original owner. In a gift economy, however, the objects that are given are inalienated from the givers; they are "loaned rather than sold and ceded". It is the fact that the identity of the giver is invariably bound up with the object given that causes the gift to have a power, which compels the recipient to reciprocate. Because gifts are inalienable they must be returned; the act of giving creates a gift-debt that has to be repaid. Gift exchange therefore leads to a mutual interdependence between giver and receiver. According to Mauss, the "free" gift that is not returned is a contradiction because it cannot create social ties. Following the Durkheimian quest for understanding social cohesion through the concept of solidarity, Mauss' argument is that solidarity is achieved through the social bonds created by gift exchange.

Critique

Mauss' views on the nature of gift exchange have not been without their critics. Testart (1998) for example argues that there are "free" gifts, such as passers-by giving money to beggars in e.g. a large Western city. Donor and receiver do not know each other and are unlikely to ever meet again. In this context, the donation certainly creates no obligation on the side of the beggar to reciprocate; neither the donor nor the beggar have such an expectation. Moreover, the transaction does not establish a relationship between the two, much less a mutual interdependence . In addition to that, there are different kinds of obligations: a) feelings of obligation, e.g. created by having been invited for dinner and having a feeling that one should reciprocate; b) social obligations, meaning that the social context obliges one to reciprocate, and that a failure to do so would not only affect one's relationship with the giver but also affect one's reputation in general; and c) legal obligations, as established through a legal contract. It can be argued that only the latter can actually be enforced. Mauss’s critics therefore claim that he overstated the magnitude of the obligation created by social pressures.

Legacy

While Mauss is known for several of his own works - most notably his masterpiece Essai sur le Don (The Gift]) - many of his best works were done in collaboration with members of the Annee Sociologique - Émile Durkheim (Primitive Classification), Henri Hubert (General Theory of Magic and Essay on the Nature and Function of Sacrifice, and others. Mauss used to work on several different things simultaneously, but unfortunately many of them he had never finished (on prayer, on nationalism, on the origins of money, etc.)

Like many prominent French academics, Mauss did not train a great number of students. Nonetheless, many anthropologists claim to have followed in his footsteps, most notably Claude Lévi-Strauss. Mauss’s essay The Gift became the origin of anthropological studies of reciprocity. His analysis of the Potlatch has been used by many interested in gift economies and Open Source software, although this latter use sometimes differs from Mauss's original formulation. The book also influenced development of economic anthropology (Karl Polanyi), and methodological individualist theory (Frederick George Bailey).

Bibliography

• Mauss, Marcel. 1979. Sociology and psychology: Essays. Routledge and K. Paul. ISBN 0710088779

• Mauss, M. 1985. (original work from 1950). Sociologie et anthropologie. PUF. ISBN 2130390897

• Mauss, Marcel. 2000. (original work from 1925). The Gift: Forms and functions of exchange in archaic societies. (Halls, W.D., trans.). W. W. Norton & Company. ISBN 039332043X

• Mauss, Mauss. 2001. (original work from 1902). General Theory of Magic. Routledge. ISBN 0415253969

• Mauss, Marcel. 2003. On Prayer. (Pickering, W.S.F., Ed.; Morphy, H. & Leslie, S. Trans.). Durkheim Press. ISBN 157181633X

• Mauss, Marcel. 2006. Techniques, Technology And Civilization. ISBN 1571816623

• Mauss, Mauss. & Durkheim Emile. 1967. (original work from 1902). Primitive Classification. University Of Chicago Press. ISBN 0226173348

• Mauss, Mauss & Hubert Henri. 1981. (original work from 1898). Sacrifice: Its Nature and Functions. (Halls, W.D., trans.). University Of Chicago Press. ISBN 0226356795

References

ISBN links support NWE through referral fees

• Allen, N.J., James, W. & Mauss, M. (Eds.). 1998. Marcel Mauss: A Centenary Tribute. Berghahn Books. ISBN 1571817050

• Fournier, Marcel. 2005. Marcel Mauss: A Biography, (Todd. J.M., Trans.). Princeton University Press. ISBN 0691117772

• Gregory, Christopher A. 1982. Gifts and Commodities. Academic Press. ISBN 0123014603

• Gregory, Christopher A. 1997. Savage money: The anthropology and politics of commodity exchange. Routledge. ISBN 9057020920

• Laidlaw, J. 2000. ‘A free gift makes no friends’ Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute 6, 617-634.

• Levi-Strauss, C. 1987. Introduction to the Work of Marcel Mauss. Routledge. ISBN 0415151589

• Moebius, Stephan & Papilloud, Christian (Eds.). 2005. Gift – Marcel Mauss' Kulturtheorie der Gabe. Wiesbaden: VS.

• Testart, A. 1998. 'Uncertainties of the 'Obligation to Reciprocate': A Critique of Mauss', In James, W. & Allen, N. J. (eds.). Marcel Mauss: A Centenary Tribute. New York: Berghahn Books.

External Links

• The works of Marcel Mauss - available free of charge (in French only) in the "Les classiques des sciences sociales" web site, inside the "Les auteurs classiques" collection.

• AnthroBase – Some discussion on Mauss’s works

• Mauss, Marcel. The Gift – PDF format of Mauss’s The Gift in English

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