Reading Blog -- Sept. 24th

Reading blog

Meaning in Artifacts: Hall Furnishings in Victorian America

Kenneth L. Ames /Journal of Interdisciplinary History, ix:i (Summer I978), i9-46.

The goal of this research is to examine artifacts and the things in the hall in Victorian America. By doing research on the hall furnishings we can understand the past better than through verbal approaches. Like other object researches, the goal is to gain the insights on understanding the objects and its relation to the surroundings.

       

Within this research, the study of hall furniture needs to start with understanding about the hall. The function and the relation of the hall in a house can explain the furniture deeper and wider.

In this reading, Kenneth L. Ames said that the trade catalog is the most valuable resource for pictorial records of individual objects. It’s almost impossible to find the records for my object. But since the owner wore that top hat in his wedding, It should be able to find some record in the St. Mary’s P.E. Church because church will record every wedding and funeral taking place in the church. Maybe there won’t be any photo in the record but I should find a more detailed record in the church archive.

Through the reading I found out that in nineteenth-century hats and coats were very important objects for daily appearance. It’s interesting to know that “The peak of popularity for the hallstand coincides with that of the top hat, which in its most extreme form became the "stove-pipe" hat of Lincoln and his generation. Laver has argued that the top hat was what we would call macho today, an assertion of masculinity most extreme at the time of greatest role differentiation between the sexes. Its gradual decline he associated with that of male-dominated society.”

Reading Blog

Sheumaker, Helen. Love Entwined: The Curious History of Hairwork in America. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2007. Print.

Hairwork does not only mean wig but also means those jewels made with hair (doesn’t need to be human hair. ex. woven hair). And those pearls or jewels are called “a hairwork device”. Portrait miniatures are small pieces of metal which the portrait of a person is in the front and was backed by hair. This shows the personal bond between individuals. In other words, compared to an only portrait miniature, the one backed by hair means stronger connections between the two people. All in all, through chapter one, hair is something that presents a person’s care about someone. Sometimes it’s just a way to express him or her selves and sometimes hair can enforce the connections between two friends (ex. Hair in album). Because a gift is not just something that you give to others, it’s something meaningful for the person. A hairwork is sometimes hard to turn into something that is meaningful “to the person who receives it”. As a result, hairwork normally is a gift only for someone is close. Both hairwork and photograph are popular but at the time, hair work was still a better thing to represent the person’s feeling because (p.49 line 21) hairwork was a product of hands and emotions, and therefore understood as a truer representation of one’s self. What people want is something that contains emotions as a gift. Not something contains only reality (ex. photo).

The trend of making fancywork (which is making something useless into something that is useful and impressive) resulted in making hairwork at home. These fancyworks can also represent a woman’s obedience and other characters. Women basically made similar shapes and models as the real professional. Making hairworks at home allows people to express a stronger feeling through the hairwork, because it was home made. The gift(hairwork, most likely is a watch fob) from female to male is the “reminder” of the “other world”, whether the emotion and the relationship is familial or romantic.

What we can see in this reading is that hairwork is not just a normal everyday object. It is something that contains personal feelings. This means there is something cultural in the object. Looking into my object, man’s top hat. I hope I can find something in this level since I have already known this object had been worn in owner’s weding.

Reading Responses -- Sept 17

In Small Things Forgotten: An Archaeology of Early American Life

James Deetz

Building in Wood in the Eastern United States: A Time-Place Perspective

Fred B. Kniffen and Henry Glassie

The United States is a nation of immigrants. To understand the people and things in the United States, we need to the study the aborigines ethnic culture and lifestyle. Starting from the colonial era from 1600s, different cultural and race groups of immigrants came to the New World to seek a better life. They brought traditional beliefs and lifestyle to America from their home country. In the new country, immigrants build their homes from one generation to another. Countering all the odds, these immigrants created one of the strongest countries in the world.

Understanding the history development of United States is not only an important thing for American people. It is also an important example of the people of other countries. In this multicultural era and rapid international changing society, it is very important for us to learn from history.

James Deetz emphasis on the objects that are commonly forgotten because those objects are understand as not important or are hard to notice. For example, ceramics in our life, tombstone, and the way how house was built. The development of these small things seems to be not important but those things can give us something more to understand our society.

        The object I have in this course is a man’s top hat. An object that I will say it’s also some small things forgotten. Hats were so important for the people in 19^th century but less people are wearing hat now a days. Studying about hats allows us to understand the roles of hat in our society. Do hats become more important to our daily life or it becomes more like a functional object that we only wear it to prevent sunburn or dazzling sun shine? The problem here is, these little things were forgotten in the history, which means there are no a lot of research about it. It is always easy to find and present the history of the objects but giving the story of an object it meaning is hard and important.

The purpose of this study is to examine the basic aspect of settlements-the methods of constructing buildings. In the timber-rich eastern United States other materials commonly used in Europe was abandoned by the immigrants. How did the immigrants build their home can reflect their needs? The fence around the house means the need for safety and the way how immigrants arrange rooms in the house also reflects their family structure. The author focuses on the year from 1790 to 1850 and records the change of the method of constructing wooden house of the immigrants.

The second stage of the research should focus on the cultural meaning of the timber construction houses. The methods within different groups of people and races would be different. The studies in wooden construction gives a lot of study examples for object analyzes, especially in the ways of how the object was made.

Object Exercise 1

Course: History 8151 /MLA 8220–Studies In American Material Culture

Instructor: Dr. Seth C. Bruggeman

Student: Brad Lin (Lin, Yu-Hsia)

Date: 2012/09/10

Assignment: Object Analysis Method /Object Exercise 1

Object:

Waistcoat_1817

Research Goal:

Waistcoat is an object that people wear, but a waistcoat is not just an object. Finding the history behind it can allow us to unveil the story and the meaning of this waistcoat in that time. Who wears it, why wear it, and what does it represent when wearing it is the goal of researching on objects.

Object Analysis Method

1.      History :

The object was made in about 1817. After knowing the time when the object was made, we can gather the information of people’s outfit from that time and research on it. For example, to analyze whether the object was a custom used for special occasion or a common wearing for daily life. More than that, what happened in that decade and the social economies changes can also reflects the living condition and helps us to interpret the meaning of the object and giving a more vivid historical meaning to the object.

2.      Material , Design and Construction

According to the information I have right now, the object I am assigned to is a ”Black velvet waistcoat with pink silk polka dots. Button closing is accomplished with self-covered buttons. The waistcoat is entirely handmade. It goes in a straight line across the bottom of the waistcoat. The collar is formed into a curved notched lape. There are three pockets. The edge of the collar and down center front is finished with a small ribbon cording. The under part of the collar is lined with satin. The back of the waistcoat is diamond-shaped pattern sateen. The entire waistcoat is lined with leather. There are two sets of brown linen tie tapes attached to the side seem to be tied together to snug the waistcoat to the figure.” I am planning to take multiple color pictures of the waistcoat as references because the texture and the design of this waistcoat is the most important matter that defines its meaning and the story. Without the picture, readers may mistakenly confuse by the description of the object.

3. Location (where does this waistcoat origin)

  The location means the origin of the object and that can be used to analyze where the object comes from and how does it involve into the form we see. For example, if this waistcoat comes from Paris or London, and follows its owner from Europe to America than we may be concluding that this object belongs to an immigrant or a merchant. If the object is made in the US, we can use this object to analyze the manufacture level of the industry.

4. Person (who can own this waistcoat)

  This waistcoat may be possessed by a male because there are three pockets on the coat, a female outfit would not have that many pockets on it. But the “pink silk polka dots” maybe telling a different story here. What we can sure is that, the delicate fixture and assembly and details indicates this waistcoat belongs to a higher social level person. 

5. Function

 The functionality of the object can let us know the social condition of the owner during that time. After we define the function of the object, we can complete the whole outfit by taking the other object that should be wearing with it. Which means, we can build a bigger picture of the owner’s life by creating a wider view of the object?

References

Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi, “Why We Need Things,” in Steven Lubar and W. David Kingery, eds., History from Things: Essays on Material Culture (Washington, D.C.: Smithsonian Institution Press, 1993).

Jules David Prown, “Mind in Matter,” Winterthur Portfolio 17 (1982): 1-19.

Joan Severa and Merrill Horswill, Costume as Material Culture,” in Dress 15 (1989). 

Statement of Purpose for American Material Culture Study

Course: History 8151 /MLA 8220–Studies In American Material Culture

Instructor: Dr. Seth C. Bruggeman

Student: Brad Lin (Lin, Yu-Hsia)

Date: 2012/09/03

Reading Blog URL: http://tuamericanmaterialculture.blogspot.com/

Statement of Purpose

I majored in sociology for undergraduate degree and now I am in the master of liberal arts program. I am interested in anything including human society operation that makes me curious about the highly developed culture and techniques. I have a great interest in issues that relates in connections between human relations and of course with objects. From attending this course, I hope to understand the connections between objects and human life. I’d like to learn not only the purpose or function of the object itself but also the meaning and the ideas applied on the object by human. As an international student from Taiwan, the most important goal is to understand American society and culture. Although that the language barrier makes this goal harder to achieve but my Eastern background gives me another point of view to observe and interpret the things learned in this country. That might make me learn how similar object has a different meaning between different people and region.To me, learning overseas is not only taking lectures in a foreign country but also is a process to practice what I learned. Through study for a master degree in another country is also a chance to learn, to experience, and to realize another cultures point of view or way to solve problems. I believe this kind of learning has far more advantages than the ordinary ones.

“The core of the Master of Liberal Arts degree entails a broad range of interdisciplinary courses that draw from such areas as cultural studies, philosophy, American studies, media/film studies, sociology, women's studies, psychology, journalism, and political science.” “In general, the great strength of the MLA program is that it can be tailored to the student's own particular interests, and students are encouraged to develop an individual focus, based on their personal, academic, and professional objectives.” Above are the concepts of the MLA program in Temple. I have always been passionate about the exploration and study in different fields. But I am more interested in doing research with a group of people from different majors or territories. In Temple University’s MLA Program, there are a wide variety of courses, and the flexibility in allowing students to develop their own intellectual pathways. I will have a chance to learn new concepts and ideas among the students and the professors. All of those advantages allow me to pursue my interest in a better, wider and deeper way.