CFP AAG 2012: Geographies of Craft and Crafting

2011-06-28 Thread Doreen Jakob
AAG Call for Papers:
GEOGRAPHIES OF CRAFT AND CRAFTING

Association of American Geographers Annual Meeting
24-28 February 2012
New York, NY

Organisers: Doreen Jakob (University of North Carolina at Chapel
Hill), Hayden Lorimer and Kendra Strauss (University of Glasgow) and
Nicola Thomas (University of Exeter)

Sponsored by the AAG Cultural Geography Study Group and the Economic
Geography Specialty Group.

>From provisioning (sewing and knitting garments, woodworking and
ironmongery etc.) to communal forms of socialisation (quilting bees,
knitting circles) to local markets (craft fairs, farmers’ markets),
crafts and crafting have been variously regarded: as peripheral
(residual, non-capitalist) forms of production; as the locus of
anti-capitalist politics; as an ideal model for cottage-scale
entrepreneurialism; and, as the essence of vernacular material
culture. When kept from public view, crafts have also long operated as
a means of personal fulfilment, self-expression, and domestic
decoration to celebrate and commemorate notable events in the life of
family or friends. As such, the practices and politics of craft
encompass a wide variety of forms of social reproduction and have been
at the centre of a range of social movements for centuries. A critical
awareness of these politics and practices has also informed the
cultural appreciation of craft in the creative arts, and its more
traditional variant of ‘folk art’.

The emergence of 'third wave' crafting in the 1990s, and the meteoric
rise of technologies and applications associated with it - from Etsy
to DIY videos on YouTube - has seen the craft movement re-emerge as a
social, economic and cultural movement of significance and scope. To
date, limited but important work by geographers has looked at craft in
relation to the fine arts and creative industries, mostly from
cultural and historical geography perspectives. This session aims to
bring together scholars from a range of backgrounds to grapple with
the complexities and contradictions of crafting from a variety of
theoretical, methodological and empirical starting points. In it we
ask: What are the geographies – cultural, political, feminist,
localist, aesthetic, economic, racial, urban, rural - of craft and
crafting?

The craft movement is socially and spatially heterogeneous. Such
diversity raises a series of questions that might constitute an
incipient research agenda. In its different manifestations how does
the craft movement embody tensions, linkages and power hierarchies
that both challenge and reflect socially-constructed categories of
difference such as gender, class, race, ethnicity and sexuality? How
do crafting practices and discourses vary within and between urban and
rural environments, regions, and nations? How does contemporary
crafting reflect and co-construct diverse politics, from radical
feminist 'craftivist' to middle-class urban nostalgia to
traditionalist conservative? In relation to labour, is crafting
simultaneously invoked as a route to entrepreneurial independence and
(as it has been historically) as an alternative to capitalist
alienated labour? How is craft to be defined in relation to art, the
artistic labour process and spaces of artistic practice (such as
galleries and art schools)? In what ways and among which communities
is craft used to encapsulate styles of life aiming to operate at a
slower tempo, or that are retrospective in character? How far is the
craft resurgence an expression of austerity chic – “keep calm and
carry on crafting”?

This session is intended to have a catalytic effect: prompting
discussion, encouraging networking and bringing together work that
represents a range of approaches to geographies of craft and crafting.
We envision papers that address one or more of the following themes:

1.  craft, labour and social reproduction
2.  ‘craftivism’ and the politics of craft and crafting
3.  crafts, hobbies and forgetting: vernacular histories and
geographies of making in everyday communities
4.  the spatialities of crafts and crafting
5.  the influence of technology in crafting
6.  the economics of crafting: its commercialization & capitalization
7.  festivals of crafts/crafts as tools for urban and economic development
8.  the changing social status of the crafter, craftsmanship and the
master craftsman


We welcome contributions that explore conceptual issues,
methodological approaches and practice-led or object-centred inquiries
into the doing and making of crafts.

Please email abstracts of 250 words or less by September 8th 2011 to
Doreen (dja...@email.unc.edu), Kendra (kendra.stra...@ges.gla.ac.uk)
and Hayden (hlori...@ges.gla.ac.uk).

Feel free to get in touch if you have any questions.



___
Dr Doreen Jakob

Visiting Scholar
University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
Department of Communication Studies
Chapel Hill, NC, USA


Special Report: A little house of secrets on the Great Plains

2011-06-28 Thread Kris Olds
A fascinating teaching device:

Special Report: A little house of secrets on the Great Plains
http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/06/28/us-usa-shell-companies-idUSTRE75R20Z20110628

Kris
http://www.facebook.com/AAGegsg


"Making Connections" Survey data available

2011-06-28 Thread Norma Rantisi
*Announcement to Listserv*



With support from the Annie E. Casey Foundation, NORC at the University of
Chicago is pleased to announce the availability of data from the *Making
Connections* Survey.  This ten‐year data collection effort has produced
nearly 28,000 interviews with residents in ten disadvantaged urban
communities at up to three points in time.  The survey data are now
available to approved researchers through NORC’s Data Enclave, a secure
environment that allows access to sensitive data from any computer.  The
Foundation encourages interested researchers, faculty, and advanced graduate
students to apply for access to the longitudinal and cross‐sectional
datasets.  We are especially interested in collaborating with faculty and
researchers who reside in or near the ten sites.  Please note that
applicants must be affiliated with an institution that is overseen by an
institutional review board (IRB).  For more information, please visit
http://mcstudy.norc.org.



*Background*

* *

The *Making Connections* Survey is one component of a ten-year
neighborhood-based initiative sponsored by the Annie E. Casey Foundation.
The survey examines mobility, social capital and networks, neighborhood
processes, civic engagement, economic hardship, the availability and
utilization of services, and child and adolescent well-being. Data were
collected in a set of ten disadvantaged urban communities across the United
States that are diverse in terms of race, ethnicity, immigrant populations,
and physical and economic characteristics. The communities are located in
Denver, Des Moines, Indianapolis, San Antonio, Seattle (White Center),
Hartford, Milwaukee, Oakland, Providence, and Louisville. The *Making
Connections* datasets include a longitudinal sample of households
interviewed at up to three points in time between 2002 and 2011, as well as
representative point-in-time samples of neighborhood and county residents.
The baseline survey was fielded in each of the ten Making Connections
neighborhoods, and in each county that contained the Making Connections
neighborhood. The Wave 2 and Wave 3 survey was fielded in the neighborhoods
only.  Baseline data were gathered between 2002 and 2004. Wave 2 was
completed between 2005 and 2007 in the same ten sites. The Wave 3 cycle was
conducted between 2008 and 2011 in seven of the ten sites.



Researchers are invited to apply for access to the data. We are especially
interested in collaborating with faculty and researchers who reside in or
near the ten sites.  If you would like to speak with someone about the *Making
Connections* survey data or application process, please send an e-mail to
makingconnecti...@norc.uchicago.edu.



Information regarding data access may be found here:
http://mcstudy.norc.org/data-access/



Publications, working papers, reports, and presentations featuring the *Making
Connections* data may be found here: http://mcstudy.norc.org/publications/


[Specialty_groups] Student Paper Competition 2012 - Applied Geography

2011-06-28 Thread Norma Rantisi
CALL FOR PAPERS - STUDENT PAPER COMPETITION
Association of American Geographers (AAG)
Applied Geography Specialty Group
The 2012 Meeting of the AAG, February 24-28, 2012, New York, NY

The Applied Geography Specialty Group is sponsoring a student paper
competition this year. The paper and its research should utilize
geographic methods, techniques, or analysis applied in service to a real
world client, while the subject-matter focus of the paper is open. One
prize ($500) will be awarded to the best paper. The student papers
cannot be co-authored with a faculty member but can range from a class
project or term paper to one that has been given at any professional
meeting in the 12 months preceding (and including) the New York, NY AAG
conference.

Participants are required to register and present in the AGSG
Interactive Short Paper (ISP) Student Session at the February 24-28,
2012 AAG Annual Meeting.

The Applied Geography Conference Board will award the student paper
winner with a free conference registration to attend the 35th Annual
Applied Geography Conference in October, 2012 in Minneapolis, MN, and an
invitation to submit the winning paper for review and possible
publishing in the Annals from that conference.

The deadline for the submission of abstracts for the Applied Geography
Specialty Group student paper competition is the same date as the AAG
deadline for abstracts. To submit an abstract to the AGSG you must first
register for the meeting. Please review AAG guidelines for abstract
submission.

Send an abstract of no more than 250 words as an email attachment and
your personal identification number (received from the AAG after
applying online at www.aag.org), along with a 100 word maximum statement
identifying the applied geography components of their paper to Dr. Dawna
Cerney at dlcer...@ysu.edu

Written papers (8,000 word maximum) are due on January 1, 2012. The
prize will be awarded based on the written papers and not on the
presentations, and the winner will be announced at the conclusion of the
interactive session. If any participants would like informal feedback on
their presentation, please advise Dr. Cerney in advance.

Both Master’s and Ph.D. students are welcome in the competition. One
prize will be awarded in the amount of $500. All authors will be
recognized for their participation.
(See attached file: Call for Student papers_AAG12.pdf)
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