books as artifacts
David Pantalony
Dear Colleagues,
Cindy Stelmackowich will be leading a discussion on Tuesday Aug. 16th focusing on anatomical books as artifacts. Her research in this area, in particular the role of touch in using anatomical books, has inspired some important conceptual breakthroughs for our upcoming exhibit on the senses in medicine.
In addition to Cindy's previously posted suggestions, I also wanted to point you to David Pearson's Books as History (2nd edition 2011). It is a quick and accessible account of the value of books as objects beyond their textual information. Books are such a familiar, taken for granted technology that work in this area provides a fresh guide for exploring artifact themes independent of their official function. Pearson asks “can a book be a book without words” while exploring historical dimensions of design, materials, artisan construction, mass production, variety, ownership, markings and books as part of collectives. It is not a sentimental connoisseur’s account of books in the digital era, but rather a clear account of their value as objects independent of their value as textual information medium. His bibliography is nicely organized into themes and references key works in the large and growing literature on Book History. I am increasingly using “book as artifact research” in conjunction with work in our collection.
Finally, I have added a few PDF articles from Dag to Google DOCS:
1. Do Artifacts Have Politics?, [from Winner, L. (1986). The whale and the reactor: a search for limits in an age of high technology. Chicago, University of Chicago Press, pp. 19-39
2. Do Politics Have Artifacts?, Bernward Joerges, Social Studies of Science, June 1999, vol 29, pp. 411-431.
3. The SAGE/BOMARC Defense System, IBM, 1958
David