looking east

My search for a master topic has already begun over a year ago. But then a job came in my way and I decided to first get some work experience (it was such a great opportunity, I simply couldn’t say no). Now I am trying to get back on track, recapitulating what I have previously read.

I started out reading Bruno Latour’s Science in Action, trying to first learn something about social science methods and how to think about technical objects and scientific papers. In his book, Latour observes scientists in their laboratories and shows how inventions are actually made. He also analyses the process of writing scientific papers and shows why these are so hard to read, but why they are so important to scientists. Bruno Latour uses the concept of black boxes for scientific theories and shows how a theory cited and recited by other scientists finally become a fact.

I also read Howard S. Becker’s work about the Art Worlds in which he shows that art is not the result of a single person’s work but that art is the achievement of a number of people. Becker thus analyses a number of different kinds of artwork and shows how they depend on many other things than just the artist. Becker’s work is interesting for my thesis because he places a work of art in a specific context that has supported or even enabled its production. Therefore one could say that art depends on the “cultural” context. And it is this context that I want to investigate, or rather the transfer from one context to another and its influence on the final product.

This entry was posted on Sunday, September 30th, 2007 at 11:33 am and is filed under asia, china, academic, art, bibliography.