wayneinkeywest on tue 7 oct 03
Janet:
The expression here is :
"The only difference between a men and boys
is the price and size of their toys."
Wayne in Key West
who goes through catalog(ue)s regularly
looking at/for new toys (sigh)
> This whole thread and the turn it has taken, reminds me of the
> central theme of Moira Vincentelli's book "Women and Ceramics:
> Gendered Vessels".
>
> The bigger, better, most, quickest is just a part of the popular
> image of the potter (a man) throwing a pot on a wheel.
> Handbuilding seems to be a feminine phenomenon and as Ms
> Vincentelli points out, historically women made pots as a
> "domestic activity". Where there is machinery or marketing of any
> scale, so the activity becomes important enough for the menfolk
> to become involved. What enters the equation first though? The
> technology or the men? Is the belief, that the more, bigger,
> better, newer more powerful the technology the better things
> are/will become, also gender based?
snip
Janet Kaiser on tue 7 oct 03
This whole thread and the turn it has taken, reminds me of the
central theme of Moira Vincentelli's book "Women and Ceramics:
Gendered Vessels".
The bigger, better, most, quickest is just a part of the popular
image of the potter (a man) throwing a pot on a wheel.
Handbuilding seems to be a feminine phenomenon and as Ms
Vincentelli points out, historically women made pots as a
"domestic activity". Where there is machinery or marketing of any
scale, so the activity becomes important enough for the menfolk
to become involved. What enters the equation first though? The
technology or the men? Is the belief, that the more, bigger,
better, newer more powerful the technology the better things
are/will become, also gender based?
I do not deny that good quality tools are always an asset, but I
suspect that generally speaking men will admire the affect the
introduction, implementation and use of "modern technology"
(expensive, cutting-edge as well as bigger/better) has for its
own sake, as much as the results produced in its use and
application. Whereas women are more enamoured of the results and
are not so interested in what was used to create/achieve them...
i.e. whatever was used is neither here nor there as long as the
outcome is satisfactory. I know it is a sweeping generalisation
and cultural changes have meant we now have women who are pretty
active in fields our grandmothers would have had little interest
in exploring, but does that DEEPER distinction between the sexes
still exist?
For example, I am the computer USER in our house, but ask me any
of the technical details on "the box and its innards" and Himself
has to answer. I neither know nor care. When buying this new
"box" the salesman and himself were going into raptures about all
the bits and bytes which would be at my disposal to USE... I was
just interested in what it would DO to make life easier... The
difference being that they both *presumed* it would be inherently
better because it was bigger and more powerful. Was my
instinctive distrust of something "new/bigger/more powerful"
being the answer more than just an experience-based caution or
was this a "typical" example of the difference between what the
sexes deem important? The means to an end versus the ends to a
means (so to speak).
I see it in young children too... The boys turning handles,
wheels, moving parts and are particularly disinterested in
anything static, whereas the little girls are busily
constructing, building, placing judiciously. Is it all part of
the primal instinct? The tools for the job being either of
primary or secondary importance? I dunno... It all goes a lot
further and deeper than cultural and social conditioning for
sure...
Sincerely
Janet Kaiser -- who has more tools than Himself and (was) better
able to use them!
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