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The Value of Aesthetics: Oaxacan Woodcarvers in Global Economies of Culture

Cant, Alanna (2019) The Value of Aesthetics: Oaxacan Woodcarvers in Global Economies of Culture. Joe R. and Teresa Lozano Long Endowment in Latin American and Latino Art and Culture . University of Texas Press, 208 pp. ISBN 978-1-4773-1881-2. (The full text of this publication is not currently available from this repository. You may be able to access a copy if URLs are provided) (KAR id:75873)

The full text of this publication is not currently available from this repository. You may be able to access a copy if URLs are provided. (Contact us about this Publication)
Official URL:
https://utpress.utexas.edu/books/cant-value-of-aes...

Abstract

Unlike many other handicrafts in the Mexican state of Oaxaca, which have long cultural and historical trajectories, Oaxacan woodcarving began in the second half of the twentieth century and has always been done for the commercial market. In The Value of Aesthetics, Alanna Cant explores how one family’s workshop in the village of San Martín Tilcajete has become the most critically and economically successful, surpassing those of neighbors who use similar materials and techniques. The dominance of this family is tied to their ability to produce a new aesthetic that appeals to three key “economies of culture”: the tourist market for souvenirs, the national market for traditional Mexican artesanías, and the international market for indigenous art. Offering a new analytical model by which anthropologists can approach visual aesthetics and conceptualize the power of artworks as socially active objects, The Value of Aesthetics shows how aesthetic practices produce and redefine social and political relationships. By investigating the links between aesthetics and issues of production, authorship, ownership, and identity, Cant shows aesthetic change to be a process that ultimately repackages everyday life into commodified objects in Oaxaca.

Item Type: Book
Subjects: G Geography. Anthropology. Recreation > GN Anthropology
Divisions: Divisions > Division of Human and Social Sciences > School of Anthropology and Conservation
Depositing User: A. Cant
Date Deposited: 19 Aug 2019 14:47 UTC
Last Modified: 16 Feb 2021 14:06 UTC
Resource URI: https://kar.kent.ac.uk/id/eprint/75873 (The current URI for this page, for reference purposes)

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