3 ms·

Is there a language with no word for money?

hinkley 6y ago
My first thought was some of the gift cultures of First Nations people, but the most obvious group that came to mind is the source of the word 'wampum', so that probably kills that theory. I think we downplay how much 'international trade' went on, and for how long. The Hopewell civilization seems to have flirted with Egyptian levels of long-distance trade. The Mississippi river valley is a hell of a highway system.
- bluGill 6y ago
  You can't infer anything from anyone who was in the Americas before Europeans. They didn't have a written record to work with, and between disease killing vast numbers; and the introduction of guns and the horse (other European technology too, but those are the big ones): their cultures were all in major change as we observed them. They probably didn't need much money then. Between being a barter society in general, and the affects of a small population relative to what the land could support there just wasn't as much to trade with each other. When someone did want to trade the Europeans had much better goods so even more of their old money wouldn't be used much anymore. Or in different words it is a lot easier to give gifts when almost all your relatives just died each leaving you a large inheritance of things. We can guess that some amount of selfishness would have come [back] to the gift giving cultures if things would have been allowed to return to "normal". That isn't to say gifts wouldn't have been important to the culture, only that they would be relatively rarer as there wasn't as much excess anyone could afford to give.
  - hinkley 6y ago
    Robin Wall Kimmerer (Onondaga) talks a good bit about gift economies, and she ties it all the way back to their oral histories. I doubt very much that you would rewrite your parables to fit the new normal. While that is a very Western thing to do, projecting your own baggage onto others is usually a mistake.
    - bluGill 6y ago
      Oral history is well known to be unreliable and changes a bit with each retelling. I didn't say they didn't have a gift culture before - those exist in other places as well. I suggested that at the time we were able to observe them there were a lot more gifts than normal, and had been for a hundred years or so - just long enough to seem like normal, but not really normal. Before and after the disruption there would be gifts - many people like to give gifts and it is a way to show your love for someone which is important. However in normal times there is a large scarcity limit to how many gifts you can give that doesn't apply.

My first thought was some of the gift cultures of First Nations people, but the most obvious group that came to mind is the source of the word 'wampum', so that probably kills that theory. I think we downplay how much 'international trade' went on, and for how long. The Hopewell civilization seems to have flirted with Egyptian levels of long-distance trade. The Mississippi river valley is a hell of a highway system.

bluGill 6y ago
You can't infer anything from anyone who was in the Americas before Europeans. They didn't have a written record to work with, and between disease killing vast numbers; and the introduction of guns and the horse (other European technology too, but those are the big ones): their cultures were all in major change as we observed them. They probably didn't need much money then. Between being a barter society in general, and the affects of a small population relative to what the land could support there just wasn't as much to trade with each other. When someone did want to trade the Europeans had much better goods so even more of their old money wouldn't be used much anymore. Or in different words it is a lot easier to give gifts when almost all your relatives just died each leaving you a large inheritance of things. We can guess that some amount of selfishness would have come [back] to the gift giving cultures if things would have been allowed to return to "normal". That isn't to say gifts wouldn't have been important to the culture, only that they would be relatively rarer as there wasn't as much excess anyone could afford to give.
- hinkley 6y ago
  Robin Wall Kimmerer (Onondaga) talks a good bit about gift economies, and she ties it all the way back to their oral histories. I doubt very much that you would rewrite your parables to fit the new normal. While that is a very Western thing to do, projecting your own baggage onto others is usually a mistake.
  - bluGill 6y ago
    Oral history is well known to be unreliable and changes a bit with each retelling. I didn't say they didn't have a gift culture before - those exist in other places as well. I suggested that at the time we were able to observe them there were a lot more gifts than normal, and had been for a hundred years or so - just long enough to seem like normal, but not really normal. Before and after the disruption there would be gifts - many people like to give gifts and it is a way to show your love for someone which is important. However in normal times there is a large scarcity limit to how many gifts you can give that doesn't apply.