Die vorliegende Arbeit stellt für die Bildwissenschaften eine methodische Grundlage dar, Kleidung im Bild als Konstruktion zu begreifen und zu interpretieren. Anhand der eindrucksvollen Patronageprojekte der Familie Tornabuoni – einer gerade emporgestiegenen Kaufmannsfamilie im Umkreis der Medici – werden die Möglichkeiten und Grenzen von symbolischer Kommunikation in der Florentiner Frühneuzeit untersucht. Unter anderem über Symbole wurde die Position im Gesellschaftsgefüge des unsicheren frühneuzeitlichen Regierungsklimas immer wieder neu hergestellt und von Neuem ausgehandelt. Die gewählte Bildgarderobe ist dafür ein hervorstechendes Beispiel. / The thesis presents an art historical methodology that assesses clothing and its pictorial representations in order to interpret how material culture relates to social construction. Using as an example an impressive patronage project of the Tornabuoni family – a newly rich family of merchants in the circle of the Medici – reveals the possibilities as well as the limitations of symbolic communication through dress in early modern Florence. In addition to outward style, these subtle symbols helped to establish and renegotiate their bearer’s position in the shifting hierarchy of an uncertain political climate. By closely examining Tornabuoni commissions, the thesis demonstrates how clothing is a critical means of understanding social motivations and aspirations.

<p>Since the late 1970s, biomedical researchers have heavily invested in the development of portable insulin pumps that allow people with Type 1 Diabetes (T1D) to carry several days-worth of insulin to be injected on an as-needed basis. That means fewer needles and syringes, making regular insulin injections less time consuming and troublesome. As insulin pump use has become more widespread over the past twenty years among people with T1D, the social and cultural effects of using these medical devices on their everyday experiences have become both increasingly apparent for individuals yet consistently absent from social and cultural studies of the disease.</p><p><br></p><p>In this dissertation, I explore the technological, medical, and cultural networks of insulin pump treatment to identify the role(s) these biomedicalized treatment acts play in the structuring of people, their bodies, and the cultural values constructed around various medical technologies. As I will show, insulin pump treatment alters people’s bodies and identities as devices become integrated as co-productive actors within patient-users’ biological and social systems. By analyzing personal interviews and digital media produced by people with T1D alongside archival materials, this study identifies compulsory patterns in the practices, structures, and narratives related to insulin pump use to center chapters around the productive (and sometimes stifling) relationship between people, bodies, technologies, and American culture.</p><p><br></p><p>By analyzing the layered and intersecting sites of insulin pump treatment together, this project reveals how medical technologies, health identities, bodies, and cultures are co-constructed and co-defined in ways that bind them together—mutually constitutive, medically compelled, cultural and social. New bodies and new systems, I argue, come with new (in)visibilities, and while this new technologically-produced legibility of the body provides unprecedented management of the symptoms and side-effects of the disease, it also brings with it unforeseen social consequences that require changes to people’s everyday lives and practices. </p>

<div> <p>The idea of “the book” overflows with extraneous significance: books are presented as windows, gateways, vessels, lighthouses, and gardens. Books speak to us and feed us, and they are a method of escape. The book has long represented much more than a static, hinged, bound, covered object inscribed with words. Even when a book is not performing an elaborate, imaginative function, the word “book” very often signifies the text it holds or even the text’s author: You can open <i>The Bluest Eye</i> or carry Toni Morrison in your bag. Fourteenth-century author Geoffrey Chaucer invokes a “book” by “Lollius” as authoritative source of his<i> Troilus and Criseyde</i>, though no person exists; likewise, to conclude the same text, Chaucer asks directs his project to “go, litel bok, go.” When a book makes an appearance in narrative, it is rarely j<i>ust a book</i>—without legs, the book moves, and without breath, it lives. This dissertation asks what about the shape of the codex has helped the book become such a metaphorically rich signifier.<br></p> <p>This dissertation attempts to unravel the various threads of meaning that make up the complex “idea of the book.” I focus on one of these threads: the book as a material object. By focusing on how the book as object—not the book as idea—functions within narrative, I argue that we can identify what about the book object enables its metaphorical range. I analyze moments in literature, television, and film when metaphorical functions are assigned, not to an ephemeral, complex idea of the book, but rather to the material realities of the book as an object. In these moments, the codex’s essential, material shape (what I am calling its bookishness) enables metaphorical functioning; I show that, by examining when mundanely physical bindings, pages, covers, and spines initiate metaphorical action, we can identify how the material book has come to mean so much more than itself.</p> <p><a></a>Indeed, despite a renewed appreciation for the book as both material and cultural object, books have become so significantly meaningful that attempts to define “the book” evade simplicity, rendering books as everything and nothing at the same time. My inquire explores this complexity by starting with a simple premise: Metaphors are based on some element of physical truth. Though the book has sprouted in a variety of metaphorical directions, many of those metaphors are grounded in the book’s material realities. Acknowledging this, especially in an age of fast-evolving media and bookish fetishism, offers a valuable and novel perspective on how and why books are both semantically rich and culturally valued objects.</p> </div> <br>

No description available.

No description available.

Syftet med denna undersökning var att belysa tre aktörsperspektiv på den kommande renoveringsvågen av GotlandsHems byggnadsbestånd: fastighetsägar-, kulturvård- och brukarperspektivet. Utifrån dessa perspektiv ville undersökningen identifiera målkonflikter samt nyansera och problematisera den rådande diskussionen kring kulturvärden i GotlandsHems bebyggelse från 1930–1975 samt sätta in renoveringsvågen av GotlandsHems bostadsbestånd i en större nationell och internationell kontext. Frågeställningarna inkluderade huruvida kulturvärden tar någon plats i diskussionen kring den kommande renoveringsvågen av GotlandsHems bostadsbestånd och vilka målkonflikter, mellan vilka aspekter, som gick att identifiera. Renoveringsvågen place- rades i en större kontext genom sitt ursprung i EU:s gröna giv och Sveriges nationella strategier. En fallstudie med tre kvalitativa intervjuer och en innehållsanalys genomfördes. Analysen identifierade fem teman: oro för hyreshöjningar, kommunikation, för- delar med energieffektivisering, återbruk och varsam renovering. I diskussionen identifierades fem målkonflikter mellan aspekterna hyresgäster, affärsmål, energieffektivisering och kulturvärden. Slutsatsen var att kulturvärden har diskuterats rikligt med flera olika infallsvinklar av alla aktörsperspektiv i denna undersökning. Diskussionen har däremot inte riktigt fått den plats som GotlandsHem borde ha gett den i förarbetet inför renoveringsvågen. En tidig utredning i renoveringsvågens projekteringsprocess av kulturvärden i GotlandsHems bostadsbestånd kommer göra avvägningar och konflikthantering mellan affärsmål, energieffektivisering, hyresgäster och kulturvärden enklare. / The purpose of this study was to highlight three perspectives on the upcoming renovation wave of GotlandsHem's building stock: the property owner, integrated conservation and user perspectives. The study wanted to identify goal conflicts as well as nuance and problematize the current discussion on cultural values in GotlandsHem's building stock from 1930-1975. From these perspectives it also aimed to place the renovation wave in a broader national and international context. The research questions included whether cultural values are considered in the discussions about GotlandsHem's upcoming renovations and which goal conflicts, between which aspects, that could be identified. The renovation wave was contextualized with a walkthrough of EU's Green Deal and Sweden's national strategies. A case study with three qualitative interviews and a content analysis was carried out. The analysis identified five themes: concerns about rent increases, communication, benefits of energy efficiency, reuse, and careful renovation. The discussion identified five goal conflicts between the aspect’s tenants, business goals, energy efficiency, and cultural values. The conclusion was that cultural values has been discussed abundantly with several different angles from all perspectives in this survey. However, the discussion has not really been given the place that Gotland- sHem should have given it in the preparatory work for the renovation wave. An early investigation in the renovation wave's planning process of cultural values in GotlandsHem's housing stock will make trade-offs and conflict management between business goals, energy efficiency, tenants and cultural values easier.

Denna studie introducerar och undersöker konceptet ”populärbyggnadsvård” i tidningar och böcker, med syfte att definiera mönster och karaktärsdrag inom populärkulturell litteratur om byggnadsvård. Undersökning utgår från typiska drag inom populärhistorian, för att se om dessa är applicerbara på den populärkulturella byggnadsvårdslitteraturen. Vidare diskuteras materialen och de typiska attributen utifrån filosofen Ludwik Flecks idéer om ”tankestilar” och ”tankekollektiv”. Metoden som brukas är både en kvalitativ litteraturstudie och en kvantitativ analys av tematik och rubriker i tidskrifter. Undersökningen resulterar i att populärbyggandsvården innefattar fyra huvudteman: bebyggelsehistoria, konstruktion, estetik och livsstil. Området besitter tydliga kommersiella drag och fokuserar till stor del på personlig känsla och upplevelse. Vidare syftar området till att vara underhållande och utbildande på samma gång. Undersökningen visar på att det kan finnas möjlighet för populärkulturen att öka det generella intresset för byggnadsvården, men att det finns en viss risk för upprepningar av information. Tidskrifterna stämde i större utsträckning överens med de identifierade dragen för populärhistoria än vad böckerna gjorde. / This essay introduces and explores the concept of “popular building preservation” in books and magazines, with the purpose to define patterns and characteristics within popular literature about building preservation. The study is based on common characteristics in popular history, to see if these characteristics can be applied on the popular literature regarding building preservation. The material and the characteristics are further discussed in relation to the philosophical ideas of “thought styles” and “thought collectives”, presented by the philosopher Ludwik Fleck. The study shows that popular building preservation embraces four main themes: built heritage, construction, aesthetics and lifestyle. The field is shown to be fundamentally commercial and its main focus is personal experience and emotion. The subject is further shown to be educational and entertaining at the same time. The study indicates that there could be a possibility for popular building preservation to increase the overall interest for built heritage, but that there also is a tendency for repeating themes and information. The magazines generally had more in common with the identified characteristics of popular history than the books.

The cedar dugout canoe is iconically associated with First Nations peoples of the Pacific Northwest coast, but the vital contribution it made to the economic and social development of British Columbia is historically unrecognized. This beautifully designed and crafted oceangoing vessel, besides being a prized necessity to the maritime First Nations peoples, was an essential transportation link for European colonists. In speed, maneuverability, and carrying capacity it vied with any other seagoing technology of the time. The dugout canoe became an important site of engagement between First Nations peoples and settlers. European produced textual and visual records of the colonial period are examined to analyze the dugout canoe as a site of intercultural interaction with a focus upon the European representation. This research asks: Was the First Nations' dugout canoe essential to colonial development in British Columbia and, if so, were the First Nations acknowledged for this vital contribution? Analysis of primary archival resources (letters and journals), images (photographs, sketches and paintings) and colonial publications, such as the colonial dispatches, memoirs and newspaper accounts, demonstrate that indeed the dugout canoe and First Nations canoeists were essential to the development of the colony of British Columbia. However, these contributions were differentially acknowledged as the colony shifted from a fur trade-oriented operation to a settler-centric development that emphasized the alienation of First Nations’ land for settler use. By focusing research on the dugout canoe and its use and depiction by Europeans, connections between European colonists and First Nations canoeists, navigators and manufacturers are foregrounded. This focus brings together these two key historical players demonstrating their “entangled” nature (Thomas 1991:139) and breaking down “silences” and “trivializations” in history (Trouillot 1995:96), working to build an inclusive and connected history of colonial British Columbia. / Graduate