Click the star to add/remove an item to/from your individual schedule.
You need to be logged in to avail of this functionality.
Log in
- Convenors:
-
Susanne Kuechler
(University College London)
Adam Drazin (University College London)
- Formats:
- Panels
- Location:
- Anthropology Library
- Start time:
- 10 June, 2012 at
Time zone: Europe/London
- Session slots:
- 2
Short Abstract:
Anthropologists from UCL's Materials, Society and Design group present new ways they have developed of engaging with the world through materials, to address such issues of wide societal impact as energy, sustainability, biomedicine, nanotechnology and intellectual property.
Long Abstract:
Materials are emerging as one of the most important, exciting research fields globally, opening up new opportunities for anthropologists. The material world we live in is not a natural one. Whether or not they are man-made, all materials only come into use through social intervention - through invention, innovation, flow, choice, discovery, design, application and use. To date, most work on materials has been scientific leading to an incomplete understanding of the processes and products of everyday life. In response, the Materials, Society and Design group in the anthropology department at UCL is developing new ways in which anthropology can engage with the world through materials, collaborating with scientists and designers to address issues of wide societal impact working. This proposal is for a constituted panel of speakers from UCL, beginning with an overview of anthropology and materials, and continuing with case studies drawn from the core agenda of the group, as follows:
1. Material Creations, Transformations, Transfigurations, Technologies: Biographies and social lives of materials, recycling, disposal innovation, energy, the movement and history of materials, nanotechnology.
2. The Macro-Politics of Materials: Sustainability and the environment, the role of the corporation, materials policy, agendas and manifestos.
3. Value and Values: intellectual property and ownership of materials , 'success' and 'failure' of materials, ethical and biomedical issues
4. Imagining Materials: Consumption of physical and virtual materials, display, marketing, heritage
5. Materials and Making: Making in anthropology, design and engineering; technology vs craft, materials libraries
Accepted papers:
Session 1Laurence Douny (Humboldt University)
Paper short abstract:
Framed within an ethnography of materials, this paper focuses on dyeing materials (indigo compound) and dyeing techniques (pits and pots technologies) employed in the making of wild silk wrappers that constitute an old textile tradition of Marka-Dafing people of Mali and Burkina Faso.
Paper long abstract:
This paper examines the technical processes by which two natural substances that are on the one hand, wild silk (produced by caterpillars) and on the other hand, indigo dye (organic compound), are transformed and incorporated into horizontal woven cotton strips that composed prestigious wrappers worn by Dafing women. This account provides an understanding of how Marka-Dafing people work with natural materials to produce these particular textiles and the production of which, results from long term experiments with matter and involve accurate knowledge about chemical processes, materials properties and efficacy. I propose that transformation techniques were developed through Dafing men and women's sensory experiences of substances, materials and thus of the matter in-the-making. As far as the design is concerned, I show that the contrasting blue and white silk strips that display as a Malinke material identity, bear an aphorism that in the manner of a visual meta-language enables to express critiques to the society that could not be verbalized. Finally, I suggest that wild silk strips qualified as 'diamand' by reference to its white colour perceived as sparkling, define a particular aesthetic of 'shine' that symbolises women's worth, wealth and thus their social status.
Fiona P. McDonald (University College London)
Paper short abstract:
Through a case study of three contemporary artists from Canada, the United States, and Aotearoa New Zealand, this presentation looks at how woollen blankets made in the UK since the seventeenth century have been sublimated and/or transformed into works of art and how this process generates knowledge and forwards theories about value and materiality.
Paper long abstract:
The sublimation and transformation of mundane material goods for aesthetics ends gives objects renewed meaning in varied contexts. The resulting shift in value(s) of objects can vary and as such generate social networks and dialogues that address the materiality of memory. Through a case study of three contemporary artists working with woollen blankets in Canada, the USA, and New Zealand, this paper will trace out how material culture that is fraught with a colonial legacy has flowed from England throughout the empire and in to the home and then to the gallery today. This discussion will look critically at how material culture enables theories of value, ownership, and identity to be considered from both aesthetic and anthropological lenses.
Urmila Mohan (University College London)
Paper short abstract:
I explore cloth as an analogical substance, material and technology of religious consciousness that mediates the realms of the tangible and the intangible among the members of the global Hindu group "International Society for Krishna Consciousness".
Paper long abstract:
Clothing in the global Hindu group "International Society for Krishna Consciousness" (ISKCON) is part of the emotive devotional tradition of "bhakti". Depending on whether the body in question is human or divine, clothing is both an everyday human activity lifted towards the spiritual realm as well as a transcendental service for a living deity image or "murthi". Yet this does not necessarily imply a static practice. I propose that phenomena like celebrity Bollywood designers dressing deities, the presence of Muslim tailors in temple sewing rooms and online debates over (in)appropriate dress are examples of how traditional clothing practices are reformulated to mediate new claims made on the ontology and cosmology of "Krishna consciousness". I propose a theoretical argument that it is the inherent flexibility of materials that allow them to act as analogies or models of religious consciousness and that it is the use and innovation of substances and techniques that coheres and sustains ISKCON. I will explore how, against a backdrop of Indian modernity, the materiality of cloth and clothing acts as an embodied form of spirituality and shapes a contemporary Hindu identity.
Chow Wah Chan
Paper short abstract:
With data on the Chinese bath market, I present the relationship between social change and fragrance preference in China challenging the linear history of fragrance common in the fragrance industry.
Paper long abstract:
Smell is one of the senses to understand the world around us. Despite its importance, it is the least understood of our senses and one of the least researched in anthropology.
I present how European centric fragrance profiles were able to dominate the market not only in China but the rest of Asia Pacific as evidenced by the market share of Lux the leading beauty bath brand in China and Asia Pacific.
This is despite the fact that the sensory culture of the west has shifted in favor of a vision centric culture at the expense of other sensory modes including that of the smell. (Classen Constance, 1993)
It is thus remarkable that western fragrance preferences have been able to exert itself via bath products in Asia especially when cultures such as in China have a long unbroken tradition of fragrance appreciation as shown in poetry, arts and even tea appreciation.
In 2007, a Chinese brand Liushen defeated Lux to become the most popular beauty bath product brand in China. This, I proposed is a result of social capital accumulated from preceding decades of economic and social development.
The data challenges the linear history of fragrances commonly used in the fragrance industry that sees the west as the center diffusing and export trends to the rest. I propose a parallel history of fragrances and understanding the ways in which social forces propel these non-western profiles into products and public consciousness.
Peter Oakley (Royal College of Art)
Paper short abstract:
An analysis of the impact of a new technology on the social institutions and professional identities of practitioners in UK assay offices, focussing on issues of attribution and agency.
Paper long abstract:
X-ray fluorescence spectrometry (XRF) machines that identify the composition of precious metal alloys are a recent technological development. Unknown two decades ago, today they are routinely used in assay offices and portable versions enable operators to conduct assays at almost any location. Prior to their development, the only accurate technique for analysing gold samples was fire assaying, a process involving the use of strong acid and molten lead and described as 'destructive, time-consuming and operator-dependent'. Conducting a fire assay requires individual expertise; it is therefore obvious who has undertaken the assay and so is responsible for the outcome. In contrast, the XRF machine not only excludes its operator from the manual procedure, it is capable of independently quantifying the resulting data and presenting a numerical result. Using data gathered from participant-observation in assay offices and metal dealerships and drawing on documentary evidence, this paper will explore the social implications of this new technology and the crisis of attribution it entails. It will demonstrate that, due to the dispersal of agency, attributing responsibility for an XRF assay has become increasingly problematic. The impact this has on systems of governance and the structure and autonomy of organisations that undertake assays will also be discussed. Through this discussion the profound and unanticipated effects changes in material culture can have on social institutions and the social identities of subjects within them will be explored.
Sarah Wilkes (UCL)
Paper short abstract:
Looking at how different interest groups within the UK Materials Industry interpret the ambiguous concept of sustainability to prioritise certain aspects and ignore others, this paper explores the relationship between the substances and things that communities make and their ethical sensibilities.
Paper long abstract:
It is often argued that sustainability is a deliberately ambiguous concept (Summer 2005, O'Riordan and Voisey 1997, Reid 1995); a catch-all term covering considerations as diverse as the labour conditions of workers in a cotton factory to quantities of volatile organic compounds released from paints and coating materials. However, in an increasingly competitive marketplace, the perceived sustainability of a material like concrete or steel could be the differentiating factor that captivates or repulses materials users, causing them to specify or "deselect" it. This paper explores the ways in which a fuzzy and global concept is interpreted, implemented and institutionalised within the UK materials industry as different interest groups struggle to define what constitutes a morality of materials.
Because sustainability covers such disparate concerns, some inevitably receive more attention than others. This paper explores the competing discourses, anxieties and patterns of attention of metallurgists, plastics producers, legislators, sustainability consultants, aerospace engineers, and fashion designers as they try to make sense of ethical matters when producing, choosing and using materials.
Finally, this paper explores the role that materials play in ordering the relations between people. By looking at the association between the concerns we prioritise and particular kinds of substances or things we make (clothing, PVC, cars or steel), it questions whether different kinds of materials enable or constrain the creation of particular kinds of institution, community and ethical sensibility.
Chih-I Lai (University College London) Michael Rowlands (University College, London)
Paper short abstract:
Bamboo, a traditional material which has recently gained increasing global popularity worldwide, is more than being merely a green material but it also has added cultural material specificity for Taiwanese designers and craft makers. This paper aims to discuses how people's identity is built and creativity is elaborated within this material.
Paper long abstract:
Bamboo, a traditional material which has recently gained increasing global popularity worldwide, has the potential to contribute to innovative environmentally-friendly designs. However, more than being merely a green material, bamboo has added cultural material specificity for Taiwanese designers and craft makers.
In the Taiwanese vernacular material culture, bamboo is widely used to assemble almost everything from kitchen utensils to dwellings. Therefore, when the National Taiwan Craft Research Institute and the Taiwan Design Center created the 'Yii collection', with the aim of presenting authentic Taiwanese design, bamboo was felt to perfectly embody this 'Taiwanese-ness'. For the past four years, several craft makers and designers were selected to work together in order to bring out new Taiwanese designs which could then be showcased at the Maison & Object and Salone internazionale del Mobile exhibitions in Paris and Milan, respectively.
These collaborations between the people drafting on the desks and those working manually in the workplaces influence each other. Through these interactions the craft makers gain broader perspectives and an awareness of the global market; and designers develop a knowledge of traditional skills and localness through the creating process. This paper will discuss how the Yii Collection provides a point around which to discuss the transformation, the impacts, and the conflicts of tradition, localness, vernacular designs, nostalgic memories, and the innovative elements which are all bound up within this material.
Jane Dickson (University of Dundee)
Paper short abstract:
Within the entanglements, commitments and practices of neoliberalism and environmentalism, 'Nature', in the form of green roofs, is being commodified as a solution to problems caused by using other forms of 'Nature', such as petroleum products, as a commodity.
Paper long abstract:
Neoliberalism and environmentalism can both be described as "a complex assemblage of ideological commitments, discursive representations, and institutional practices" not least because they developed together and influenced each other (McCarthy & Prudham 2003:2). However, their entanglements have been largely theorised within anthropology as concerns over the effects of neoliberal policies on the environment. Using the case of the green roof movement, it can be shown that the relationship is more reciprocal, with environmentalism interacting and helping to shape the way neoliberal governance is conducted.
The success of the movement over the past 10 years is due to the materiality of green roofs which have been packaged for the market and this has led to their successful engagement and inclusion within the contemporary systems of neoliberal governance, evident in policy statements and commitments, in London and elsewhere.
The production of values; scientific, commercial, environmental, social and political come together in a product which can be positioned to solve multiple problems, incorporated within existing models of production; be generic or specialized. Their incorporation within discourses of localism and individualism subsequently allows them to be absorbed into and implicated within the formation of policy at the local and city levels.
Nature, here, has been materialized to mitigate and adapt to the problems caused by using nature as a commodity, a situation many would argue has caused the ecological problems in the first place.