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Trobriands Research Paper

Decent Essays

The Trobriands consist of four main islands located off the coast of Eastern New Guinea. The most populated of the four islands is Kiriwina that has 60 villages that house 1200 individuals (Peters-Golden, 2009). The Trobianders are a horticultural society that focuses on the production of yams. This essay focuses yams being a symbol of relationships, power, and wealth for the Trobianders over the past century. Marriage is the starting point of the yam exchanges that binds relationships (Peters-Golden, 2009). When a Trobriand man marries a Trobriand woman they declare the marriage by eating yams together. After they celebrate their one-year anniversary the women’s father begins a garden for her and plants a new crop of yams for her yearly.

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