Browsing by Subject "Material culture"
Now showing 1 - 6 of 6
Results Per Page
Sort Options
Item The Augustinian canons of St. Ursus : reform, identity, and the practice of place in Medieval Aosta(2011-05) Kaufman, Cheryl Lynn; Newman, Martha G., 1958-; Frazier, Alison Knowles; Kamil, Neil D.; Holladay, Joan A.; Peers, Glenn A.This dissertation studies a local manifestation of ecclesiastical reform in the medieval county of Savoy: the twelfth-century transformation of secular canons into Augustinian regular canons at the church of Sts. Peter and Ursus in the alpine town of Aosta (now Italy). I argue that textual sources, material culture, and the practice of place together express how the newly reformed canons established their identity, shaped their material environment, and managed their relationship with the unreformed secular canons at the cathedral. The pattern of regularization in Aosta—instigated by a new bishop influenced by ideas of canonical reform—is only one among several models for implementing reform in medieval Savoy. This study asserts the importance of this medieval county as a center for reforming efforts among a regional network of churchmen, laymen, and noblemen, including the count of Savoy, Amadeus III (d. 1148). After a prologue and introduction, chapter 1 draws on traditional textual evidence to recount the history of reform in medieval Savoy. Chapters 2 through 4 focus on the twelfth-century sculpted capitals in the cloister built to accommodate the common life of the new regular canons. Several of the historiated capitals portray the biblical siblings, Martha and Mary, and Leah and Rachel, as material metaphors that reflect and reinforce the active and contemplative lives of the Augustinian canons. Other capitals represent the regular canons’ assertion of their precedence over the cathedral canons and suggest tensions between the two communities. The final chapter examines thirteenth-century conflicts over bell-ringing and ecclesiastical processions in the urban topography of Aosta to illustrate how the regular and secular canons continued to negotiate their relationship. Appendices include an English translation of a vita of St. Ursus (BHL 8453). The dissertation as a whole reconstructs the places and material culture of medieval Aosta to convey the complexities of religious and institutional life during a time of reform and beyond.Item Outward appearance, inward perceptions : preservation of identity among K'ichee' women(2011-08) Wallace, Joseph Brandt; Garrard-Burnett, Virginia, 1957-; Menchaca, MarthaOutward Appearance, Inward Perceptions: Preservation of Identity among K’ichee’ Women offers a look into the changing patterns of identity and regional Maya clothing among the female members of a rural K’ichee’ Maya municipality located in the Western Highlands of Guatemala. It provides a brief framework of the history and importance of Maya clothing in Guatemala as well as in the context of the rural Maya community. Building upon a loose theoretical framework based on works by Irma Otzoy (1992, 1996a, 1996b), Clifford Geertz (1997), and Paul Connerton (1989), the current study was aimed at examining the connections that exist between one municipality’s female regional style of clothing and the redefining of sacred spaces for cultural and identity preservation and an analysis of historical memory related to material culture. This descriptive study was conducted among a sample of K’ichee’ Maya women (N=18) over a two month period in 2010. Qualitative data were collected using an open-ended semi-structured interview guide. Major themes that emerged from the data were the vital roles that female community members play in the preservation of local culture and the changing and adaptive nature of material culture. The findings suggest that local identities and culture change alongside the changes occurring in municipal traje use, and pride and respect for local origins is preserved through performative ritualItem Solitary girls : longing among wards of the state(2011-05) Del Sol, Marina; Lein, Laura; Strong, Pauline Turner, 1953-; Menchaca, Martha; Stewart, Kathleen C.; Franklin, MariaI am researching the experience of foster care drift. This term refers to children who are considered homeless because it is not clear where they are going next. Research shows that the majority of children who have experienced foster care drift lead unstable lives after reaching the age of eighteen. They have high levels of poverty, homelessness, and incarceration, lack the most basic literacy and life skills, do not sustain employment, and lack health care and mental health care. The research is centered in a residential treatment center for girls. I conducted ethnographic research while working with about two dozen girls, aged seven to seventeen, on service-learning projects. The girls designed projects in which they developed a sense of helping someone else. Frequently these projects involved the making and exchange of material objects. Unfortunately, the institutional structure isn’t set up to provide such activities on a regular basis. My analysis focuses on how the girls use objects to gain social status and form bonds with others. I seek to understand the nature of their sense of ownership and belonging in a group, which differ markedly from those valued outside the system. The skills the girls are practicing in the residential treatment center will serve them well in total institutions such as prisons and mental hospitals, but they will have a hard time succeeding in a job or educational setting.Item Some versions of the fragment, 1700-1800(2014-08) Schneider, Rachel Marie; Bertelsen, Lance; Cohen, Matt, 1970-; Moore, Lisa L; Baker, Samuel; Pagani, KarenSome Versions of the Fragment, 1700-1800 examines the eighteenth-century literary print fragment archive to redefine the fragment as a genre typified by its materiality. Eighteenth-century fragments included not just sentimental poems, but novels, satires, and political pamphlets. They are both long and short; written by famous and anonymous authors; canonical and unknown. This dissertation, in recuperating the eighteenth-century fragment’s rich variety, offers a taxonomy that includes three versions of the fragment: the unintentional, the intentional, and the complete. Examining the fragment in this way not only provides categories that can help us better understand how fragments fit within various social and cultural conditions in the eighteenth century, but also how these ways of understanding the fragment can help critics account for its evolutions today. Previous analyses of the literary fragment have emphasized its metaphorical qualities and its formal dimensions. This dissertation argues that the genre is defined no less by its materiality: prefaces, punctuation, and page arrangements are the common constitutive elements shared by all three versions of the fragment. By paying attention to the eighteenth-century fragment’s materiality, critics today can better account for the fragment’s role in the period’s generic developments, as well as its evolving literary marketplace.Item The materiality of Tejano identity(2016-12) Hanson, Casey; Wade, Maria Fátima, 1948-; Creel, Darrell; Franklin, Maria; Doolittle, William; Menchaca, MarthaScholars have examined Tejano identity through various theoretical and methodological lenses, but in general, all are interested in highlighting Tejano agency in the development of Texas. As diachronic examinations of identity, these investigations are often situated in terms of shifting ethnic identities, where a broad range of backgrounds came to share common concepts of Tejano identity through shared experiences and the dynamic context of the frontier. This dissertation builds upon this research and comprehensively evaluates Tejano identity through an examination of the archaeological record from a perspective based in theories of materiality. Like previous investigations, my dissertation is a diachronic study that conceptualizes Tejano identity as a changing ethnic identity, but as an examination rooted in material culture studies, my dissertation provides a new perspective into the role of Tejano agency in the development of region. My dissertation asks what objects and what material practices were integral to the formation of Tejano identity and how did those practices change over time? To answer these questions, I compared the material worlds of various Tejano families and individuals from the eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries and explored how objects were enmeshed in the work of subject formation over time. In my dissertation, I present the archaeological and archival data from three case study sites, the eighteenth century deposits at Spanish Governor’s Palace (41BX179), the late eighteenth and early nineteenth century deposits at and the Delgado Cistern (41BX1753) and the Mexican Period Padrón-Cháves Midden and Siege of Béxar entrenchment (41BX1752) as well as a number of other related sites. The comparative analyses reveal that local traditions, technologies, and practices contributed to the establishment of a distinct regional identity in the early eighteenth century. Many aspects of this identity endured into the nineteenth century, although other aspects of identification began to shift due to the introduction of new material practices through an illicit trade network that helped to forge a unified Tejano identity across frontier communities. Finally, the unprecedented amount of goods introduced to the frontier along with Anglo-American colonists during the Mexican Period exposed Tejanos to an array of new practices that fractured Tejano identity and reshaped the frontier.Item Thinking beyond utility and practicality : art education discussion viewed through the lens of a three-function model(2012-12) Lee, Elizabeth Rachel; Bolin, Paul Erik, 1954-; Mayer, Melinda MThis study was about language. Its purpose was to explore how a specific set of material culture ideas is represented in art education discussion through what is termed in this study “the three-function model.” The model states that all human-made objects, including images, perform multiple roles and/or serve multiple purposes, simultaneously, and without limit. These roles and functions of objects fall into three categories: technological (utilitarian); sociological (communicative); ideological (instructive). Discovering this model inspired two questions: (a) how might the three-function approach to the discussion of objects augment art education’s understanding and practice of Material Culture theory? (b) to what benefit might such an approach be integrated into art education practice? To answer these questions, I designed a two-stage analysis. First, the examination of literature written toward three audience groups (educator-oriented, practitioner-oriented, general audience) in order to identify three types of information (definitions, statements about objects, and statements about function) for the purpose of forming an overall understanding of how cohesive or disparate discussion appears to be within each audience group. Second, cross-analyzing the three information groups for the purpose of understanding the similarities of and differences between the discussions of the three audience groups. The results of this study suggest that the problem of multiple and contrary definitions for shared terminology may be restricted to only two important words: craft and art. Conceptual approaches employed by the writers included anthropological, philosophical, concrete, theoretical, advocate, and analytical. Although all 15 writers acknowledge the social nature of objects, and all employ the term function similarly, there are indeed gaps in art education discussion: social and ideological functions of craft and art objects that go unnoticed, and missed opportunities to explore those connections and their cultural relevance. The three-function model can provide names for the ideas we are talking around, but not quite about.