礼物、生命仪礼和人情圈——以徐家村为例

Gift, Ritual and the Circle of Human Relationship: Xujia village as a case

In many villages of China, farmers are entangling in continuing ritual gift exchanges with other farmers. It’s a dilemma: farmers are unwilling to continue the exchange but they can’t cease it by themselves. Based on fieldwork in Xu Village in Hubei Province, this paper points out two questions,that is why farmers are entangling in the continuing ritual gift exchange cycle? And is it possible for them to get out of this cycle? The author constructs a theory system by analyzing the relationship among “gift", “ Renqing cycle" and “life rite". Traditional ritual gift exchange stemmed from life rites, and developed into relative regular forms: Renqing cycle, gift and Renqing ethics. These gift exchanges offered farmers with social resource, but as time going, its forms were alienated from ritual gift exchanges, and to most farmers, became a burden rather than any thing else. The author points out this change by analyzing the process of alienating and some implying rules among farmers: collective principle, hinting and understanding strategy, not going beyond principle. At last, based on a new change, the author thinks it’s possible for farmers to get out of the cycle.