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This thesis argues that a unique design ideology manifested in Soviet Estonia during the Late Socialist period. It was a combination of broader Soviet design ideologies concerned with material practices and the control of production, and Western design influences that were more apparent in Estonia than elsewhere in the Soviet Union and provided aesthetic guidance in a vacuum of Soviet style. This research allows for the first time a determination of the characterising qualities of Estonia’s Late Socialist industrial design, as well as provision of a new contextual framework for considering Soviet design ideas more broadly. To date, studies of Soviet design have focused on object aesthetics, leaving authors who are then faced with the absence of a consistent Soviet style to assume an equally absent Soviet design ideology. However, while it is not necessarily visible in the appearance of products, a tangible Soviet design ideology existed in bureaucratic apparatuses, material practices and accompanying textual materials. This thesis uses oral history and archival research to provide a detailed analysis of the Soviet ideology operating within one cultural monad of the wider USSR. In doing so it breaks away from the emphasis on Russia as the totality of 20th century Soviet socialism to make a first important step toward a more substantial history of Soviet production. Estonia can be understood as a meeting point between two major world design cultures, and from its example we can better understand the characteristics, functioning, and impact of different design ideologies.

This thesis examines the construction and functions of intellectual disability in the modernist literature of the American South from 1925-1940. The period saw a remarkable proliferation of intellectually disabled figures in various guises. These include William Faulkner's Benjy in The Sound and the Fury which has become one of the most analysed 'idiots' in all literature. However, the wider trend of which he is a part has largely lacked critical attention. Furthermore, the connections between this regional literary trend and the prominence of the eugenic movement in the era have been unexplored. This thesis questions why intellectual disability was so important to Southern writers in particular, and why it appears so frequently in their works. The thesis also examines the extent to which Southern writers incorporated eugenic ideas into their representations and how authors reinforced or challenged contemporary ideas regarding intellectual disability. The thesis offers detailed close readings from a selection of southern writers’ works contextualised with primary and secondary historical source material to adequately trace the period’s social, scientific and aesthetic models of intelligence and intellectual disability. The thesis argues that intellectual disability and eugenics were integral to the ways in which southern writers represented their region, not only in negotating regional and national anxiety regarding southern intelligence, but also acting as a crucial vehicle through which these authors examined the South's uneasy and peripheral relationship with modernity. The thesis adds to a growing understanding of the cultural significance of intellectual disability and the eugenic movement and shows how southern modernists' depictions of intellectual disability were linked to and can illuminate understandings of regional and national debates in the period about intelligence, inheritance, disability, family, community, and modernity.

This study investigated the history of traditional Korean papermaking within its historical context: the relationship with the development of papermaking techniques in neighbouring countries were examined though primary focus was given to the development of materials and tools used. In order to understand the characteristics of historical Korean paper and the development of tools and materials used over time, surveys on Korean and Japanese collections at the British Library and a private Korean collection were carried out. Korean objects dated between the 12th and the 18th century were examined. The data collected from the surveys was compiled in a database and analysed. The data analysis revealed that the thickness of paper was closely related to the thickness of bamboo splints used in manufacture of papermaking screens. Research also included a summary of morphological characteristics and photomicrographs of fibres from nine indigenous plants which were used for traditional Korean papermaking. These standard fibre samples were used as reference to identify the fibres of unknown paper objects surveyed. This fibre identification confirmed the main material to be paper mulberry and, additionally, provided information on supplementary materials including rice straw, reed, hemp, and mechanical wood pulp of coniferous origin — a material that has not been recognised as one of the common supplementary materials in previous studies. In order to provide a better understanding of the materials and tools used in traditional papermaking in Korea, three papermaking experiments were carried out. Firstly, a papermaking experiment was conducted using a mucilaginous substance derived from the roots of Hibiscus Manihot, which has been employed as a formation aid for considerable time in Korea and Japan. Paper samples were then analysed to investigate the physical influence of the substance on the sample sheets. Secondly, a fixed laid screen was designed and sheets were produced using it. The intention here was to support a hypothesis which was proposed by the author in order to explain a possible chronological development of papermaking mould structure in China and its potential spread to neighbouring countries. The last experiment was conducted to simulate a technique of papermaking with reclaimed paper. Although the use of reclaimed paper was recorded in early literature, details of the process were unknown.

This thesis discusses how British Quaker women negotiated relinquishing their religiously prescribed Plain dress from 1860 to 1914 in the context of developments in Quaker feminine identity. This thesis approaches its subjects by examining the primary source of surviving Quaker garments in British dress collections. These items provide the basis from which research methodologies and the personal narratives of Quaker women and their case studies are developed. Surviving garments, alongside historical letters, diaries, religious texts, department store catalogues, photographs and period dress illustrations are analysed in order to understand how women Quakers practised their religion and organised their public appearance through dress during this period. The original quality of this research is the outcome of an interdisciplinary approach. No other research project in the international dress history or religious history fields has discussed and critically considered the identity of British Quaker women through an analysis of their surviving clothing between 1860 and 1914. This aspect of British social history and therefore British identity has until now remained unexplored and unacknowledged. By 1860 Quakerism had undergone extreme doctrinal upheaval, which had led to the abandonment of those rules which enforced Plainness of speech and apparel that same year. Even prior to 1860, this thesis reveals that some women were incorporating fashion into their religious Plain dress, by using fashionable silhouettes and high-quality fabrics albeit eschewing bright colours and ornamentation. After 1860 however, male and female Quakers had complete individual freedom of choice in their clothing. During this period of religious turmoil, female Victorian Quakers vocalised a range of opinions on women's emancipation, education and welfare, on their role within the religious society and their opinions concerning dress through published correspondence in Quaker journals. This thesis identifies a variety of views concerning dress between 1860 and 1914, as Quaker women negotiated their individual freedom of choice in attire in a ternary manner. Moreover, this thesis proves that this ternary interpretation was acknowledged by Quakers themselves and discussed within Quaker journals in the 1860-1914 period. Quakers of the period identified these ternary interpretations as ascetic, moderate and fashionable. This thesis proposes a new set of classifying terms, Non-Adaptive, Semi-Adaptive and Fully-Adaptive, in reflection of the extent to which Quaker women adapted their religious clothing to incorporate fashion alongside their differing interpretations of Quaker belief. Four case studies illustrate further these three adaptive interpretations, and show how individual Quaker women chose to present themselves to their religious community and wider society.