Beads and Bead Makers - Gender, Material Culture and Meaning

Beads have been used since antiquity, not only to dress the body, but as measures of value in economic and ritual exchanges. Their popularity has never waned, and in recent years their trade has enjoyed a world-wide revival. Beads have deep and multiple meanings: in many cultures, together with garments, they reflect age, gender and social status, and are a vehicle through which people store, exchange and transmit wealth.This absorbing book analyzes techniques and gendered aspects of the making of beads, as well as their role in trade and body adornment, in a wide range of societies, from the ancient Mediterranean to Renaissance Venice and present-day Southern Africa and West Africa, where they have become a symbol of cultural survival and identity. Anyone interested in material culture, anthropology, art history, and gender studies will find that this book provides fascinating insights into attitudes toward the body and its dress as well as systems of social classification.>

About the author

Joanne B. Eicher is Regents Professor Emerita at the University of Minnesota. Joanne is Editor-in-Chief, Encyclopedia of Dress and Fashion (Bloomsbury and OUP); Series Editor, Dress, Body, Culture (Bloomsbury) and Dress and Fashion Research (Bloomsbury); Editor, Global Trade and Cultural Authentication: The Kalabari of the Niger Delta; and Co-Author, The Visible Self, (Fairchild); Dress and Gender (Berg); Dress and Ethnicity (Berg); Beads and Beadmakers (Berg); Mother, Daughter, Sister, Bride (National Geographic); and a wide variety of published articles in professional journals and chapters in books.

Product details

• Authors: Joanne B Eicher, Joanne Bubolz Sciama Eicher, Lidia Sciama, Lidia D Sciama, Lidia D. Sciama
• Assisted by: Joanne B. Eicher (Editor), Eicher Joanne B. (Editor), Lidia D. Sciama (Editor), Sciama Lidia D. (Editor)
• Publisher: Berg Publishers Ltd
• Languages: English
• Product format: Hardback
• Released: 01.05.1998
• EAN: 9781859739907
• ISBN: 978-1-85973-990-7
• No. of pages: 336
• Dimensions: 156 mm x 234 mm x 17 mm
• Series: Cross Cultural Perspectives on; Cross Cultural Perspectives on; Cross-Cultural Perspectives on; Cross-Cultural Perspectives on Women
• Subjects: Non-fiction book > Dictionaries, reference works > Dictionaries, encyclopaedias; SOCIAL SCIENCE / Popular Culture, SOCIAL SCIENCE / Women's Studies, Fashion & society, Gender studies: women, Gender studies: women and girls, Cultural studies: dress and society