IMC 2013: Sessions
Session 631: ANT(ics): Objects and the Thingliness of Things
Tuesday 2 July 2013, 11.15-12.45
| Organisers: | Ben Jervis, Department of Classics & Archaeology, Birkbeck, University of London Helen Price, School of English, University of Leeds |
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| Moderator/Chair: | Harold Mytum, Centre for Manx Studies, University of Liverpool |
| Paper 631-a | Entangled Vessels: Enacting Pottery in Medieval England (Language: English) Index terms: Anthropology, Archaeology - Artefacts, Daily Life, Technology |
| Paper 631-b | 'In Medias Res': Ecomaterialism and the Environments of Old English Poetry (Language: English) Index terms: Daily Life, Language and Literature - Old English, Technology |
| Paper 631-c | Names and Actors: ANT between Text and Materiality (Language: English) Index terms: Archaeology - Artefacts, Language and Literature - Scandinavian, Mentalities |
| Abstract | Objects and texts exist in the same material world, whereby each actively shapes the meaning and existence of the other. Both texts and objects are simultaneously constructing and being constructed by the environments in which they act. Through its exploration of a range of medieval texts and artefacts, this interdisciplinary session engages with Actor-Network Theory and other relational approaches to investigate the often overlooked connections between object, text, and the wider world. The papers will explore the idea that the meaning and properties of objects are not inherent within them, but are defined relationally; the properties of objects emerge from the formation of multiple relationships with and between them. This session pushes and challenges traditional readings of objects and their literary counterparts to provide new insights into the life, agency, and thingliness of things. |