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Photographs, Skeuomorphs and Marionettes

Some Thoughts on Mind, Agency and Object

Carl Knappett

Christ’s College, University of Cambridge, UK

The aim of this article is to investigate the agency of objects, a seemingly paradoxical statement within most recent western thought, in which agents and objects are sharply contrasted. However, in an important attempt to overcome the profound dichotomy between people and things, the observation that ‘objects have social lives’ has become something of a mantra in material culture studies. Yet rather more than a mantra is required if we are to move forward in our understanding of the complex workings of material culture; we need to investigate the potentially diverse processes whereby ‘inanimate’ objects come to be socially alive. To this end, an interdisciplinary approach is adopted that draws upon current research in archaeology, anthropology, aesthetics, sociology, and cognitive psychology.

Key Words: agents/objects • hybridity • networks • icon/index • skeuomorphs

Journal of Material Culture, Vol. 7, No. 1, 97-117 (2002)
DOI: 10.1177/1359183502007001307
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