Why read Artefacts as Categories?

Book cover of Artefacts as Categories: A Study of Ceramic Variability in Central India

Book description

The aim of Artefacts as Categories is to ask what we can learn about a society from the variability of the objects it produces. Dr Miller presents a comprehensive analysis of the pottery produced in a single village in central India, drawing together and analysing a whole range of aspects…

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Why read it?

1 author picked Artefacts as Categories as one of their favorite books. Why do they recommend it?

Monica L. Smith

Author

Miller’s work in village India – a world away from most of our experiences – focuses on the way that people make things to be bought and used, cherished and given, and broken and discarded, all with a feedback loop from producer to consumer and back again. Through his conversations with artisans, he reveals that when high-status people buy certain shapes, lower-status people start to want them also, until those shapes become too “common” and high-status folks begin to show their distinction through the patronage of a new design. The cycle is never-ending, and Miller’s memorable words are always in…

From Monica's list on why humans have so much stuff.