Abstract
This paper is based on PhD research, which identifies a problem with researching and theorizing craft, and explores a method, which draws on ethnographic video oral history approaches for gathering data relating to practice. The purpose of the method is to advance understanding of practice and to develop theory that is grounded in the experience of practice. The method involves filming craftspeople working, then interviewing them whilst they watch the film of themselves. The paper outlines the critical context for the research, drawing on the model of Becker’s Art Worlds to assert that a legitimizing infrastructure has evolved to support a professionalized art/craft World. A principal concern of this infrastructure has been to recontextualize the crafts and establish a definition of Craft as a singular thing within the sphere of its influence. A critical convention of the art/craft World has been the idea of a canon of key figures and objects. This supports a mode of enquiry that is suited to interpreting aesthetic objects rather than to understanding craft as a human activity set within a dynamic totality, in which the object may be regarded as one element. By narrowly defining the object of critical interest the totality and continuity of reality is disrupted. This study suggests a model for craft discourse, which shifts the focus away from key figures, exemplary objects etc. and employs an approach that seeks to understand craft within a continuum. The research method will be described and framed within an academic context. Related studies are identified and it is argued that, whilst these studies demonstrate the usefulness of the approach, there is a further need for material that is concerned specifically with understanding craft practice and with finding meaning that is located in the subjective experience of practice, from which theory that is grounded in practice can be developed.
Keywords
Craft; Ethnography; Knowledge/practice interface; Video oral history
DOI
https://doi.org/10.21606/eksig2011.102
Citation
Harper, P.(2011) Doing and Talking: Articulating Craft, in Niedderer, K., Mey, K., Roworth-Stokes, S. (eds.), EKSIG 2011: Skin Deep - Experiential Knowledge & Multi-sensory Communication, 23–24 June 2011, Farnham, United Kingdom. https://doi.org/10.21606/eksig2011.102
Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License
Doing and Talking: Articulating Craft
This paper is based on PhD research, which identifies a problem with researching and theorizing craft, and explores a method, which draws on ethnographic video oral history approaches for gathering data relating to practice. The purpose of the method is to advance understanding of practice and to develop theory that is grounded in the experience of practice. The method involves filming craftspeople working, then interviewing them whilst they watch the film of themselves. The paper outlines the critical context for the research, drawing on the model of Becker’s Art Worlds to assert that a legitimizing infrastructure has evolved to support a professionalized art/craft World. A principal concern of this infrastructure has been to recontextualize the crafts and establish a definition of Craft as a singular thing within the sphere of its influence. A critical convention of the art/craft World has been the idea of a canon of key figures and objects. This supports a mode of enquiry that is suited to interpreting aesthetic objects rather than to understanding craft as a human activity set within a dynamic totality, in which the object may be regarded as one element. By narrowly defining the object of critical interest the totality and continuity of reality is disrupted. This study suggests a model for craft discourse, which shifts the focus away from key figures, exemplary objects etc. and employs an approach that seeks to understand craft within a continuum. The research method will be described and framed within an academic context. Related studies are identified and it is argued that, whilst these studies demonstrate the usefulness of the approach, there is a further need for material that is concerned specifically with understanding craft practice and with finding meaning that is located in the subjective experience of practice, from which theory that is grounded in practice can be developed.