Kula Ring
A ceremonial exchange system linking Trobriand and neighboring islands in the Massim archipelago, in which armshells (mwali) and necklaces (soulava) circulate continuously in opposite directions around the ring. Bronisław Malinowski used the kula to argue that the exchange is not trade in the ordinary economic sense — the valuables have no practical use, and their entire worth comes from the prestige and biography they accumulate through motion, not from possession itself.