Week 9

Reading Summary

My reading for this week was a few pages from the book Common Threads: Weaving Community through Collaborative Eco-Art by Sharon Kallis and published by New Society Publishers in 2014.

https://newsociety.com/books/c/common-threads

This chapter of the book discusses the fact that in the modern times in which we live, we don’t make things ourselves anymore.  In the past, items such as food, clothing, tools, building materials, toys, etc. would have all been made by oneself or one’s family for personal use.  There has been a progression of outsourcing the manufacturing of these items, first to local factories, then national factories, and now to factories half way around the world in developing nations.  Kallis states this is possible largely due to the availability of cheap fossil fuels, and as we now attempt to transition away from reliance on fossil fuels this all needs to change.

STOP - Made in Canada?

This made me stop and think about the things I buy and where they come from.  There aren't too many things I can think of that are made in Canada; big bulky items like sofas and vehicles are still made here, as I suppose those must be costly to ship from far away.  

In my town, there are a few local-made items that are very well known around town.  One is Pollen Sweaters, which are really nice locally made wool sweaters.  They come in a few dozen colors, lots of sizes, and are made to order.  They're expensive but I think almost everyone I know owns one.

Here's my daughter wearing a Pollen Sweater, the color is called sweet pea I think.  (It's the first sweater pic I found on my phone - lost her tooth on a camping trip!)

Another local business is Cranberry Pottery, which for decades sold pottery made on site.  They had about a half dozen different series/motifs, and were a very common gift item.  Almost every home has an item or two from Cranberry Pottery somewhere.

Both of these hand made items are a sort of mathematical object when you think about it. There are ratios, amounts, measurements, symmetries, etc. to consider and then use or create.  The makers of these items were definitely doing some mathematical thinking!

Kallis introduces the term backsourcing, which might be defined as reclaiming the making of things that have in the not-too-distant past been outsourced to be made elsewhere.  She acknowledges that initiatives such as community gardens are examples of backsourcing that has already begun, but that increased effort ought to be made to backsource other manufactured items.

She also discusses some of the social-emotional benefits of backsourcing.  Backsourcing allows us to relearn lost skills and un-vent (her term, which I assume is wordplay referencing ‘invent’) ancestral knowledge that's at risk of being lost due to outsourcing.  Kallis claims that “the act of learning to make for personal use what we have previously purchased is perhaps the most fundamentally important gift we as individuals can give to ourselves”.  She further points out that making things (and opting out of consumer culture) is empowering, builds self-esteem, gives one an emotional boost, and creates a sense of pride of a job well-done. 

STOP - D.I.Y.

I really agree with Kallis about the satisfying feelings one gets from making your own things.  Making home-made products and being self-reliant is very important to my family. On our rural property we have bees, chickens, and a big veggie garden, and generally try to fix and build things ourselves when we can.  I think it does feel good to do things yourself - I like that sense of accomplishment, and that food from the garden sure does taste good.

There's still a lot more big-picture backsourcing we could be doing though, but making things like clothing, electricity, and building supplies would really take a lot of effort to do on your own!  It's probably more reasonable to focus on skills to enjoy as a hobby, like knitting or woodworking, or little life-hack type things like making your own all purpose cleaner or plant fertilizer, and of course there are little bits of mathematics embedded in all of those activities.

The excerpt ends by her stating that in the following pages she will discuss three backsourcing projects that she’s been personally involved in.  I’m curious about reading more about these projects, and if you are too it appears that the full book is available online as a PDF through the UBC library website.

Activity - Rope Making

After watching the two videos on grass rope making, I decided to give it a try.  My mom's long-time winter season hobby is weaving (mostly things like rugs, table runners, etc.) and while watching the videos I realized that I'd done this same twisting technique as a child while helping my mom create the tassels on the ends of a rug!  See one of her rugs below.

I recall being amazed back then as a child that the two separate twisted strands automatically begin wrapping around each other, and that after a knot was tied in the end it resisted unravelling.

I was interested in some of Susan's ideas about this activity - using upcycled materials and also performing a strength test.  I chose to use some plastic shopping bags as my rope material.  I chose two different colors so I could more clearly see the pattern that develops.   

After my rope was completed I knotted the ends together to make a loop.  I hung our hammock chair from the loop and although it stretched out a bit, it had no problem supporting my body weight!

It's pretty amazing how much stronger the plastic bags are in rope form compared to when they're used to carry groceries or other items!  As explained in the first rope video, by twisting the two strands you're compressing the material together which gives strength in addition to the tensile strength of each strand/fiber, so a rope is actually stronger than the sum of the strengths of all the individual fibers!  This synergy is a great metaphor for teamwork, and is something I would definitely discuss with my students if we were doing a group rope making activity like in the second rope video.  I'd like to give it a try with my classes later this spring when the weather improves a bit.

This activity made me consider the origins of this rope making technique, and due to its simplicity and utility I would guess it has been independently discovered/developed hundreds or thousands of times all across the world!