CASCA/SANA2016 panel CFP: The power and place of the gift in contemporary solidarities

The power and place of the gift in contemporary solidarities

Call for Papers

Solidarities CASCA 2016



Marcel Mauss' conceptualization of the gift offers an alternative to
understanding (non)market exchange through the economic lens of individual,
rational actors. Reminding us that transactions of giving and receiving are
imbued with morality, Mauss demonstrates that the gift functions to
establish solidarity and maintain long-term social relations. Recent
ethnographic research has extended the topical currency of this analytic by
following the exchange of a wide range of items and encounters framed as
gifts across contemporary social and geopolitical boundaries. Relationships
of reciprocity developed through current forms of gift exchange – such as
state-run conditional cash transfer programs, or volunteer-run social
programs that fill the gaps left by a shrinking welfare state – ask us to
consider the nature of these solidarities. This panel explores how this
anthropological concept of long durée may help us to understand
contemporary solidarities in local communities, state-citizen exchanges,
and beyond.



We invite papers that investigate these relationships and transactions
through the analytical lens of the gift. Prospective panelists may wish to
consider:



- how social actors negotiate or frame these gifting relationships, and/or
how such relationships and exchanges are framed as gifting;

- how participation in these relationships frames or situates these
subjects in the community through the creation of alliances and affinities;

- how different interests are served and solidarities forged through the
establishment of gifting relationships;

- how the gift may be used to understand morality in the context of
globalization and/or neoliberalism.



If interested, please send paper title and your abstract (150 words) to
Rhiannon Mosher rhmosher@yorku.ca and Chantelle Falconer
chantelle.leblanc@utoronto.ca by January 29, 2016. We will begin reviewing
abstracts as they are submitted. Thank you for your interest.