Button hook ? O.K. -- here's one:
http://www.homecareproducts.com.au/prod27.htm Now, let's start listing what it can tell us about the "economic, social, and cultural circumstances of its audience" 1. This is a society that practices a variety of technologies (plastics - metallurgy) etc only available in modern times 2. And so -- it requires a society that is sufficiently literate, sedentary, stable 3. With skills that require a differentiation of labor 4. Including a managerial class as well as technicians and laborers whose work they manage 5. while judging from its aesthetic -- it's a culture (or sub-culture) that places no great value on the aesthetics of functional items. 6. And concerning a person who actually owns a button hook today (do any of us ?) -- such a person is probably an actor or collector of antique or high-fashion garments (or might only have the use of one hand) And that's just my haphazard guess. I'm sure that a professional archeologist or cultural anthropologist could go much further -- not only with button hooks, but with paper clips, note pads etc. Everything that people make ( copolites as well art works) can tell the astute observer a great deal about the "economic, social, and cultural circumstances" of their origin. But art works (or at least some of them) can show us that which is "unborn, eternal, everlasting, primeval, and does not die when the body dies" (Bhagavad Gita, Canto Two, Sloka 20) ____________________________________________________________ Compete with the big boys. Click here to find products to benefit your business. http://thirdpartyoffers.netzero.net/TGL2231/fc/BLSrjnxUkjC5SXNTNeouWT3ii7bFOd M4q62nD57oaGCjsuoGYsthBFWuafG/
