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Friends first: childhood birthdays, giving and receiving

Ever since childhood birthday parties allow a process of socialization. Such ritual, which usually gathers children of a same age group, is an opportunity to exchange presents: gifts and counter-gifts structure the sequences of birthday parties. An ethnological approach thus enables to seize the contribution of each social actor (children, parents, relatives, and friends) in the social constructions of this ritual. Presents are the object of a real negotiation implying a permanent confrontation of norms and values through which a social link is built.

Birthday; Ritual; Gift; Counter-gift; Childhood; Socialization


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