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Written texts and the performance of materiality

Richardson, Catherine (2014) Written texts and the performance of materiality. In: Riello, Giorgio and Gerritsen, Anne, eds. Writing Material Culture History. Bloomsbury, London. ISBN 978-1-4725-1856-9. (KAR id:51354)

Abstract

This chapter aims to indicate the various ways that historians can analyse how language conjures things into being. It shows that a detailed analysis of words can investigate the role played by language as the medium in which information about objects is communicated. It argues that reading about things always involves some kind of call to the imagination of the reader – obviously on the stage, but also in the archive. In our perception of the significance of the relationship between words and things, reading is, it is argued, a kind of performance of objects in itself; a reanimation of the relationship between language, materiality and the imagination.

Item Type: Book section
Subjects: D History General and Old World
P Language and Literature > PR English literature
Divisions: Divisions > Division of Arts and Humanities > School of English
Depositing User: Catherine Richardson
Date Deposited: 02 Nov 2015 18:39 UTC
Last Modified: 06 Feb 2021 08:29 UTC
Resource URI: https://kar.kent.ac.uk/id/eprint/51354 (The current URI for this page, for reference purposes)

University of Kent Author Information

Richardson, Catherine.

Creator's ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-6168-4192
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