Introduction

Examining The Collection

Methodology

Lynching History

Wider Southern History

Consumption

Conclusion

Home

Prown, Jules, "Mind in Matter: An Introduction to Material Culture Theory and Method," Winterthur Portfolio 17, no. 1 (Spring 1982) 1-19.

Prown's methodology was developed under a broad and dynamic interdisciplinary umbrella, featuring structuralism and semiotics, marxism, anthropology, geography, psychohistory and psychology. It also draws on broad theoretical backgrounds - cultural history and cultural anthropology, social history and social anthropology – as well as the particular theoretical backgrounds of structuralism, semiotics, and determinism.

Description

  • substantial analysis: comprehensive, descriptive physical inventory
  • content: iconography, overt representations, inscriptions, motifs
  • formal analysis: visual character, form, configuration, colour, texture

Deduction

  • sensory engagement
  • intellectual engagement
  • emotional response

Speculation

  • theories and hypotheses
  • program of research

On to My Model