Knitting the archive

Shetland lace and ecologies of skilled practice

Dados Bibliográficos

ID2406313
AutoresJoanna Mann (University of Bristol, autor correspondente)
Ano2018
Volume25
Fascículo1
Páginas91-106
Data de publicação2018-01-01
Peer ReviewedSim
Open AccessSim
TipoARTICLE
PeriódicoCultural Geographies (JOURNAL)
Identificadores do periódicoISSN: 1474-4740 • E-ISSN: 1477-0881
EditoraSAGE Publications Inc (PUBLISHER)
DOI10.1177/1474474016688911
OpenAlexW2581989846
IdiomaEN
Citações recebidas16

Conjuring up images of fine openwork shawls, Shetland lace knitting might seem to be the very essence of 'tradition'. Although contemporary scholarship is increasingly noting the diversity of knitting practices and practitioners - from stitch 'n bitch to yarn bombing - accounts of Shetland lace knitting often convey a sense of a skilled practice which has remained unchanged since time immemorial. In this article, I illustrate and unravel how the skill of Shetland lace knitting has become seemingly sedimented by telling its story through a series of innovative archival explorations and engagements. Using 'making' as method, I employ the skilled practice of knitting as a means by which to investigate the question of skill itself. By putting the anthropologic work of Tim Ingold into conversation with contemporary geographical theory, I advocate an ecological consideration of skill which is able to account for the economic, cultural, geographical and material threads of practice, while undermining any notion of skill being static or given within a situation

Aesthetics · Art · Conversation · Diversity (politics · Geography · Political science · Scholarship · Shetland · Sociology · Visual arts · Anthropology · Communication · Crafts, Textile, and Design · Cultural Industries and Urban Development · Fashion and Cultural Textiles · History · Law