text: Science Fair Projects - Potlatch
  Categories: Canadian history | Native American culture
  A potlatch is a ceremony among certain First Nations peoples on the Pacific Northwest coast of the United States and the Canadian province of British Columbia such as the Haida, Tlingit, Tsimshian, Salish, Nuu-chah-nulth, and Kwakiutl (Kwakwaka'kawakw). The potlatch takes the form of a ceremonial feast traditionally featuring seal meat or salmon. In it, hierarchical relations between groups were observed and reinforced through the exchange of gifts and other ceremonies. The potlatch is an example of a gift economy, whereby the host demonstrates their wealth and prominence through giving away their possessions and thus prompt participants to reciprocate when they hold their own potlatch. Although this sort of exchange is widely practiced across the planet (consider, for example, the Western practice of buying one's friends rounds of drinks), the potlatch is the example of this phenomenon that is most widely known to the public.
  Potlatching was made illegal in Canada and the United States in the late nineteenth century, when the government considered such displays 'irrational' and a waste of valuable resources that would be better use to help Native North Americans develop and acculturate into Canadian/American society. As understanding of the true nature of the potlatch grew it was made legal once again; 1934 in the United States and 1954 in Canada.
  See also Koha, a similar concept among the Maori
  References Kan, Sergei (1993). Symbolic Immortality: The Tlingit potlatch of the nineteenth century. Smithsonian Series in Ethnographic Inquiry. Washington, DC: Smithsonian Books.
  External links Potlatch entry from the Encyclopedia of North American Indians	On-line exhibition on potlatch from the Peabody Museum	Potlatch Then and Now: a website on potlatch from a Kwakwaka'wakw cultural heritage organization