Paper short abstract:

The paper deals with the sensory perception of textiles, particular within families and mother-daughter relationships. Based on ethnographic fieldwork it focuses on exchange modes in terms of transmission and circulation, furthermore investigates the role of sensory knowledge within these processes.

Paper long abstract:

Clothes play a crucial role in life with regard to the perception of the body. To dress is like put one's body on display. Furthermore a particular garment gives shape to movements and causes visual, haptic, auditory and olfactory experiences. Hence, to dress is a concrete incorporating practice whereby social structure is embodied by the wearer. Based on this notion, the paper is dealing with clothes as means to articulate relationships between two generations. The paper draws from an ethnographic study in German mother-daughter relationships, and focuses on the significance of sensory knowledge in this context from a series of perspectives.

As the women were asked to describe their clothes in front of their wardrobes and additionally using family photo albums it became obvious, that the descriptions of sensory knowledge in different cohorts resembled. This leads to the assumption of distinct sensory experiences with regards to cut or fibre due to the sartorial biography of the wearer. As in families different cohorts come together this sensory memory is of importance in regard to the habitus. Hand-me-downs or items borrowed temporally appeared as material devices to establish and negotiate connectivities and dependence. In this respect clothes became a means to pass on "skilled visions" (Grasseni 2007). On the backdrop of such observations the paper seeks to discuss not just sensory knowledge as embodied knowledge in intergenerational relationships but also reflects the role of the researchers own perception in learning about the textiles in the field herself.