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This page is about gifts in the common English-language sense. For other uses, see Gift (disambiguation).

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A gift or present is the transfer of money, goods, etc., without the direct compensation that is involved in trade, although possibly involving a social expectation of reciprocity, or a return in the form of prestige or power. In many human societies, the act of mutually exchanging gifts contributes to social cohesion. Economists have elaborated the economics of gift-giving into the notion of a gift economy.

By extension the term gift can refer to anything that makes the other more happy or less sad, especially as a favor, including forgiveness, and kindness (even when the other is not kind).

The background may be:

• Someone has more than another
• Something bad happened to another
• Expression of love or friendship
• Expression of gratitude for a gift received
• Custom, on occasions (often celebrations) such as
  • A birthday (the person who has his or her birthday gives cake, etc. and/or receives gifts)
  • Father's Day (the father receives gifts)
  • Mother's Day (the mother receives gifts)
  • Christmas (people give each other gifts, often supposedly receiving them from Santa Claus)
  • Saint Nicholas (people give each other gifts, often supposedly receiving them from Saint Nicholas)
  • A wedding (the couple receives gifts and gives food and/or drinks at the wedding reception)
  • A funeral (visitors bring flowers, the relatives of the deceased give food and/or drinks after the ceremonial part)
  • A birth (the baby receives gifts)
  • Passing an examination (the student receives gifts)
  • Supplying food and/or drinks to someone invited in the home
  • Giving a round of drinks in a bar.
  • Lagniappe

A gift may either be an ordinary object or an object created for the express purpose of gift exchange, such as the armbands and necklaces in the Trobriand Islands' Kula exchange.

A gift can also be a special talent or ability that was not earned through the usual amount of long and difficult practice but instead comes easily to the recipient in a natural way. A person with such a gift is said to be "a natural" or "gifted" in that field of endeavor. A gift, in this sense, can be thought of as being given by God or by nature: a God-given or natural gift received by one at birth. For example, a fluent and entertaining speaker is said to have "the gift of gab".

Ritual sacrifices can be seen as return gifts to a deity. Sacrifice can also be seen as a gift from a deity: Lewis Hyde remarks in The Gift that Christianity considers the Incarnation and subsequent death of Jesus to be a "gift" to humankind, and that the Jākata contains a tale of the Buddha in his incarnation as the Wise Hare giving the ultimate alms by offering himself up as a meal for Sakka. (Hyde, 1983, 58-60)

See also

• Alms
• Altruism
• Random act of kindness
• Atonement
• Charity
• Debt relief
• Red packet
• Regifting
• TANSTAAFL
• Tip

Further reading

• Marcel Mauss and W.D. Halls, Gift: The Form and Reason for Exchange in Archaic Societies, W. W. Norton, 2000, trade paperback, ISBN 039332043X
• Lewis Hyde: The Gift: Imagination and the Erotic Life of Property, 1983 (ISBN 0394715195), especially part I, "A Theory of Gifts", part of which was originally published as "The Gift Must Always Move" in Co-Evolution Quarterly No. 35, Fall 1982.

External link

• World Kindness Movement

Topics related to charity (list of charities): Philanthropy | Alms | Tzedakah | Zakat | Altruism | Gift | Donation Non-governmental organization | Registered charity, Charitable trust | Foundation | Non-profit organization | Not-for-profit corporation Volunteer | Philanthropist

This article is based on the article "Gifts" from Wikipedia - the free encyclopedia created and edited by online user community. This article is distributed under the terms of GNU Free Documentation License. Here you find the list of authors of this article. The article can only edited within Wikipedia. Edit this article in Wikipedia.

Greetings are social customs or rituals to show attention or to confirm friendship or social status between individuals or groups of people meeting each other. Greeting habits are highly culture- and situation-specific and may change within a culture depending on social status. This topic excludes military and ceremonial salutes but includes rituals other than gestures.

Some epochs and cultures had very elaborate greeting rituals, e.g., greeting of a king.

Secret societies have clandestine greeting rituals that allow members to recognize common membership.

Spoken

Spoken greetings are customary or ritualised words or phrases used to introduce oneself or to greet someone. In English, some common verbal greetings are:

• "Hello", "hi", and "Hey" — General verbal greetings. The latter two are less formal. According to the Oxford English Dictionary, the first citation of "hey" is found as early as 1225, and is defined as "a call to attract attention . . . an exclamation to express exultation . . . or surprise." The English language's other monosyllabic greeting, "Hi", is actually much newer, having become popular in the 1920s. Many languages use the word as a greeting, though a variety of spellings exist, including "hei" and "hej".
• "Good morning", "good afternoon", "good evening" — More formal verbal greetings used at the appropriate time of day. Note that the similar "good night" and "good day" are more commonly used as phrases of parting rather than greeting, although in Australian English "G'day" is a very common greeting.
• "What's up?", "How's it going?" and "What's happening?" — informal greetings used frequently
• "How do you do?" Has two usages, depending on the country. For example in Ireland it should be treated as a salutation, whereas in England it should be treated as a question that requires an answer.
• "Howdy" — Informal greeting. Derived from "how do you do," it is common in the rural regions of the United States.

Verbal greetings in other languages may also be found at common phrases in different languages.

Gestures

• Bowing
• Cheek-kissing
• Handshake
• Hand-kissing
• Hat-raising
• Hat-tipping
• Kowtow
• Namaste
• Roman salute
• Waving

See also

• Salute
• Pascha greeting

This article is based on the article "Greetings" from Wikipedia - the free encyclopedia created and edited by online user community. This article is distributed under the terms of GNU Free Documentation License. Here you find the list of authors of this article. The article can only edited within Wikipedia. Edit this article in Wikipedia.