Honor
Geertz explains that, while money is a central element of Balinese cockfighting, the matches are also more thoroughly driven by honor or status. Balinese culture is oriented around reputation, especially for men, and especially for aristocratic men. This is why the cockfights are so significant; they represent competing manhoods. Individuals enter their roosters to compete, which are figuratively perceived as an extension of the male form. Critically, however, Geertz notes that cockfights do not actually change anything related to Balinese status and hierarchy. Their influence is temporary, and a well-off competitor will either affirm his status through a win or be insulted through a loss.
Masculinity
Just as the word "cock" is a double entendre in English, so it is in Balinese. The cocks represent the manhood of their owners, and indeed are often perceived as a physical extension of the male form. Despite this focus on masculinity, however, the Balinese treatment of their fighting cocks is careful and nurturing: cocks are bathed as if they were infants, and are fed strict, laborious diets. Alongside the Balinese valuation of masculine virtues like strength, honor, rage, and power therefore exists a similar valuation on domestication, nurture, and tenderness.
Symbolic Anthropology
This is a branch of anthropology that Geertz establishes in this essay. He explains his methods of cultural analysis using the symbol of cockfighting. In this manner, he takes the event of a cockfight and extrapolates and analyzes all the various insights and consequences of the fights in the representation of Balinese culture. Why do the fights exist? What sort of people compete? What do they compete for? All of these questions have both a literal answer pertaining to the physical events as well as symbolic answers for the values of the Balinese culture as well.
Perception versus Reality
One point that Geertz emphasizes, particularly in the early sections of the essay, is that one's perceptions of another culture are often too simplistic and misguided. He notes, for example, that he and his wife were treated with relative apathy when they first arrived in Bali. Only after they were accepted by the villagers (after fleeing a police raid) did Geertz come to understand this apathy as purposeful, directed, and a significant part of Balinese cultural affect. Similarly, Geertz challenges the Western notion that cockfighting is only about brutality and bloodshed, instead showcasing its complexity, organization, and social import.
Duality and Paradox
When Geertz launches into his explanation of how wagering works in Balinese cockfights, he sets up a paradigm of two bets: the center bet, which occurs between the handlers of the cocks and their allies, and the side bets, occurring among the crowd. Geertz at first describes these two forms of bets as polar opposites, with the center bet following strict, formal rules while side bets are made through shouts and hand gestures. However, Geertz ultimately argues that this perception of incongruity is in fact merely an apparent one. When one considers the wagers themselves, Geertz notes, one can observe how the center bet influences and dictates the side bets. It is the center bet, Geertz says, that serves as a vehicle for "interesting" or "deep" matches.
Cultural Generation
Toward the end of the essay, Geertz presents his twofold conclusion about Balinese cockfighting: first, that cockfighting is a symbol in which broader elements of Balinese culture are reflected, and second, that cockfighting is also a mode of generating that culture to begin with. Because of its importance and utility in Balinese society, cockfighting is in many ways (according to Geertz) an art form, and one that puts Balinese sensibility on display at the same time it contributes to cultivating that sensibility even further.
Art and Literature
As Geertz concludes the essay with a more abstract interpretation of Balinese cockfighting, he uses the comparison to art and literature in order to better emphasize the importance of the practice for Western readers. Geertz argues that cockfighting can be "read" as one would read a text – that is, it can be appreciated as a reflection of a particular reality and interpreted as "saying something" about that reality. By comparing cockfighting to literature, Geertz emphasizes how seminal and pervasive the practice is for the Balinese people, while also suggesting that Western notions of "art" can be expanded to consider phenomena with equal or greater cultural import.
