Paper short abstract:

Money can be: Traditional Vs Neoliberal. This duality of money is entailed in the cultural practice call Panapayattu, in South India. It may counter to the idea of neoliberalism on the question of money.

Paper long abstract:

For Mauss gift practices (The Gift, 1925) give , take and return is essentially represents a pre-modern social relations. In this particular context it is important to understand what is Panapayaattu? Though it can be defined as a system or a network of relations exists among the people of a particular part of Malabar (South Asia) by their money use or exchange.

The ethnography of neoliberalism would suggest that its overarching dependence on money and as a result of which people uses violent means to get accumulated because they satisfy the desire and pleasures. But, the ethnography of Panapayattu, a more subtle use of money, a thing to be created collectively which satisfy their long wishes of a some land, house and a decent life.