Crafts In The World Market

The growing exchange of traditional craft objects in world markets has had a profound impact on the lives of the women and men who produce them. These essays describe how the flow of goods from the industrial centers of the world to the colonies in earlier centuries is now met by a reverse flow as consumers seek the exotic and unique objects of handicraft production in Third World countries. The book explores the paradox of how artisans continue to create traditional objects, yet new sources of wealth and intensified production are transforming their traditional lifeways in areas such as the Oaxaca Valley, the Yucatan, Highland Chiapas, and Guatemala.

Today it is not uncommon to find items in department stores that are hand-crafted in countries like Thailand and Costa Rica. These "traditional" crafts now make up an important part of a global market. They support local and sometimes national economies and help create and solidify cultural identity. But these crafts are not necessarily indigenous. Whereas Thailand markets crafts with a long history and cultural legacy, Costa Rica has created a local handicraft tradition where none was known to exist previously. In Global Markets and Local Crafts, Frederick F. Wherry compares the handicraft industries of Thailand and Costa Rica to show how local cultural industries break into global markets and, conversely, how global markets affect the ways in which artisans understand, adapt, and utilize their cultural traditions. Wherry develops a new framework for studying globalization by considering the phenomenon from the perspective of the supplier instead of the market. Drawing from interviews and extensive fieldwork shadowing artisans and exporters in their daily dealings, Wherry offers a rare account of globalization in motion—and what happens when market negotiations do not proceed as planned. Considering economic and political forces, flows of people and materials, and frames that define cultural and market situations as they play out in the artisan communities of these two countries, Wherry uncovers how authentic folk tradition is capitalized or created.

This book unfolds rather like a good novel; it is compelling and convincing. The authors approach their topic with a great deal of background and superb organizational abilities. As the premise unwinds, readers are provided with excellent explanation and justification, as well as real-life accounts of people and their experiences. As a side benefit, the book also yields an admirable example of well-done qualitative case studies that are triangulated effectively with survey methods. --Sara U. Douglas, University of Illinois Social Responsibility in the Global Market illuminates an alternative way of conducting business that bridges the consumer′s social concerns and the producer′s financial concern through a compatible, nonexploitive, and humanizing system of fair trade. In-depth case studies introduce past successes and failures for seven Alternative Trading Organizations (ATOs) as they foster artisan empowerment, cultural integrity, and business sustainability. An integrative model synthesizes business conditions, tasks, and skills imperative for effective functioning of a fair trade system in an increasingly competitive global market. Mary Ann Littrell and Marsha Ann Dickson′s treatment of ATOs provides useful insights for academics in marketing, international development, entrepreneurship, and anthropology. In addition, this book offers practical finance for practitioners in international development, socially responsible businesses, and consumers concerned about impacts of their marketplace decisions.

Homeworkers in Global Perspective documents the lives of homeworkers, exploring state policies towards them, and describing the innovative ways in which homeworkers organize. Moving away from well-known, already explored cases, the essays focus on less-known but equally compelling examples organize, and covers the major geographic regions of the world and illustrates the diversity of home-based work and homeworker organizing.

With new markets opening up for goods produced by artisans from all parts of the world, craft commercialization and craft industries have become key components of local economies. Now with the emergence of the Fair Trade movement and public opposition to sweatshop labor, many people are demanding that artisans in third world countries not be exploited for their labor. Bringing together case studies from the Americas and Asia, this timely collection of articles addresses the interplay among subsistence activities, craft production, and the global market. It contributes to current debates on economic inequality by offering practical examples of the political, economic, and cultural issues surrounding artisan production as an expressive vehicle of ethnic and gender identity. Striking a balance between economic and ethnographic analyses, the contributors observe what has worked and what hasn't in a range of craft cooperatives and show how some artisans have expanded their entrepreneurial role by marketing crafts in addition to producing them. Among the topics discussed are the accommodation of craft traditions in the global market, fair trade issues, and the emerging role of the anthropologist as a proactive agent for artisan groups. As the gap between rich and poor widens, the fate of subsistence economies seems more and more uncertain. The artisans in this book show that people can and do employ innovative opportunities to develop their talents, and in the process strengthen their ethnic identities. Contents Introduction: Facing the Challenges of Artisan Production in the Global Market / Kimberly M. Grimes and B. Lynne Milgram Democratizing International Production and Trade: North American Alternative Trading Organizations / Kimberly M. Grimes Building on Local Strengths: Nepalese Fair Trade Textiles / Rachel MacHenry "That They Be in the Middle, Lord": Women, Weaving, and Cultural Survival in Highland Chiapas, Mexico / Christine E. Eber The International Craft Market: A Double-Edged Sword for Guatemalan Maya Women / Martha Lynd Of Women, Hope, and Angels: Fair Trade and Artisan Production in a Squatter Settlement in Guatemala City / Brenda Rosenbaum Reorganizing Textile Production for the Global Market: Women’s Craft Cooperatives in Ifugao, Upland Philippines / B. Lynne Milgram Textile Production in Rural Oaxaca, Mexico, and the Complexities of the Global Market for Handmade Crafts / Jeffrey H. Cohen "Part-Time for Pin Money": The Legacy of Navajo Women’s Craft Production / Kathy M’Closkey The Hard Sell: Anthropologists as Brokers of Crafts in the Global Marketplace / Andrew Causey Postscript: To Market, To Market / June Nash

Turn Your Crafting Into a Career! All over the world, creatives are turning their hobby into their livelihoods--and Crafter's Market offers the competitive edge you need to make your craft your career. This comprehensive guide will introduce you to a new world of possibilities for taking your craft to the next level. To help you on your journey, this edition is updated with fresh resources, such as: • Over 250 new listings for complete, up-to-date contacts and submission guidelines for more than 1,500 craft market resources, including craft shows, publishers, marketplaces, and more! • Informative, inspirational articles on building your brand, customer communication, teaching classes, getting press coverage, photographing your goods, and more, from successful craft business owners. • Actions you can take today to grow your business now, no matter your creative medium--quilting, sewing, knitting, crochet, papercraft, or jewelry making! Whether you're looking to expand your online presence or you're just beginning to think about how to turn your weekend hobby into a side business, Crafter's Market is the complete resource for creative professionals.

This book considers the transformative impact of global trade and production networks on local economies, work and labour organization, and various forms and meanings of 'community'. It examines the socio-economic transformation in Asia and the restructuring of manufacturing industries, ports and the information technology sector.

Illustrated with 200 stunning photographs and encompassing objects from furniture and ceramics to jewelry and metal, this definitive work from Jo Lauria and Steve Fenton showcases some of the greatest pieces of American crafts of the last two centuries. Potter Craft

From the grassroots to the global, women's movements worldwide are taking on new arenas, new goals and strategies, and in some cases a whole new vocabulary. International organizations, nonstate actors, regimes and norms, and a host of globalizing forces offer women and their representatives new opportunities and obstacles. This volume draws together a wide range of exciting new research that looks at the gendered nature of the institutions, practices, and discourses of global governance. The contributors describe the spaces women have carved out in international organizations, the strategies women's movements have employed to influence international politics, and the ways in which movement activism has contested gendered rules in global governance. Out of a stimulating diversity of approaches, the common goal of empowering women resounds.