Material Subject

<p><em>The Material Subject</em> emphasises how bodily and material cultures combine to make and transform subjects dynamically. The book is based on the French <i>Matière à Penser </i>(MaP) school of thought which draws upon the ideas of Mauss Schilder Foucault and Bourdieu among others to enhance the anthropological study of embodiment practices techniques materiality and power. </p><p>Through theoretical sophistication and empirical field research case studies from Europe Africa and Asia bring MaP’s ideas into dialogue with other strands of material culture studies in the English-speaking world. These studies mediate different scales of engagement through a sensori-motor affective and cognitive focus on practices of making and doing. Examples range from the precarity of professional divers in French public works to the gendered subjectivity of female carpet weavers in Morocco from the ways Swiss watchmakers transmit craft knowledge to how Hindu devotees in India make efficacious use of altars and from the enskilment of Paiwan indigenous people in Taiwan to the prestige of women’s wild silk wrappers in Burkina Faso. The chapters are organised according to domains of practice defined as 'matter of' work and technology heritage politics religion and knowledge. </p><p>Scholars and students with an interest in material culture will gain valuable access to global research rooted in a specific intellectual tradition.</p>