| Description |
1 online resource (xiii, 275 pages) : color illustrations, color maps |
| Physical Medium |
polychrome |
| Description |
text file |
| Bibliography |
Includes bibliographical references and index. |
| Contents |
Preface: Arrival -- 1. Introduction -- 1.1. Broken thread: heritage that survival centuries about to be forgotten -- 1.2 Finding the story's thread: preceding projects -- 1.3 Tying the knot: apprenticeship -- 1.4 Weaving the tale: matriarchs' lessons, big and small -- 2. Places and faces -- 2.1. The 'hidden' Kam: the Kam ethnic group -- 2.2. Dimen, the Kam spring: Dimen highlights -- 2.3 The 'living' museum: Dimen Dong Cultural Eco Museum -- 3. The living legends -- 3.1. The Za at a glance: five matriarchs I apprenticed with -- 3.2. Wu Meitz: the humble wealth of knowledge who never judges the younger generations -- 3.3 Wu Gaitian: the only one who remembers the origin of all beings -- 3.4. Wu Mnci: the widow who raised five sons and sang through it -- 3.5. Wu Yingniang: the one who sees once and remembers everything -- 3.6. Wu Huazhuan: the orphan who never went to school but learned it all -- 4. Papermaking -- 4.1. Paper magic: magic of Kam paper -- 4.2. Bark stripping: separating bark layers with a sickle -- 4.3. Mulberry hunt: finding mulberry tree branches -- 4.4. Endless mashing: making paper -- 4.5. Different processes, same results: slightly different techniques to make paper -- 4.6. Little books to store her treasures: making paper purses -- 5. Back-strap loom -- 5.1. Weaving ABCs: introduction to weaving and back-strap looms -- 5.2. Liping interlude: gathering with Wu Mnci and her family in Liping -- 5.3. Colorful threading: making a back-strap loom and warping it --5.4. Flower my belts: weaving 'flower' belts on a back-strap loom -- 5.5. Baby steps: we weave a simple pattern on a back-strap loom -- 5.6. After all, practice makes perfect: restretching warp on a back-strap loom and making secondary heddles |
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6. Spinning and preparing thread -- 6.1. From flowers to fabric: making Kam fabric -- 6.2. Yarn beyond compare: spinning yarn from ramie fibers -- 6.3. Sunny twists: preparing cotton thread -- 6.4. Songs and cones: winding threads on cones and preparing the warp -- 7. Frame loom -- 7.1. Great-great-grandmother's loom: Wu Meitz tells the history of her loom -- 7.2. Let the timber sing: Kam loom anatomy --7.3. Dressing the loom: beaming the warp and preparing the loom -- 8. From back-strap to frame loom -- 8.1. Breaking the back on warping benches: warping a frame loom to make narrow drawstrings -- 8.2. Drawstring as an art form: weaving narrow decorative drawstrings on a frame loom -- 9. Indigo paste -- 9.1. Indigo blues: indigo around the world -- 9.2. Two tales of orphaned girls: taboo surrounding indigo -- 9.3. Four seasons: taking care of indigo plants -- 9.4. Making the Kam gold: preparing indigo paste -- 10. Indigo vat -- 10.1. Grandmother's bath: preparing an indigo dyebath -- 10.2. Blue do-over: redoing indigo dyebath -- 10.3. Sometimes others know better: Miao people's indigo dyebath -- 11. Dying the indigo -- 11.1 Blue nails are in: dying hand-made cloth in indigo -- 11.2. Dye, dye, dye some more: second indigo dyeing lesson -- 11.3. Interlude: feast for a baby: we visit a baby celebration -- 11.4. Loop backwards: I hang the cloth the wrong way -- 11.5. Our blues of the blues: we dye in our vat, unassisted |
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12. Post-indigo treatment -- 12.1. Stiff beans: treating the cloth with bean starch -- 12.2. Mountain goats: finding roots and leaves to make red dye -- 12.3. Red to black: making red dyestuff and apply it to indigo-dyed cloth -- 12.4. Ox sludge: making ox skin liquid and treating the fabric with it -- 13. Pleated skirt -- 13.1. Sticky flutes: pleating fabric for a skirt -- 13.2. Itchy hair: sewing pleats together and stiffening the skirt in ox skin liquid -- 13.3. Hollow buckets: steaming the skirt pleats and dyeing them in indigo -- 13.4. Sticky stiching: hand-sewing the skirt -- 14. Embroidery -- 14.1. Sunflowers and moths: Kam embroidery -- 14.2. The ageless under-apron: under-apron made more than sixty-five years ago -- 14.3. Bridge super sampler: Wu Mnci shows her embroidery -- 14.4. Flower past blossom: satin stitch embroidery technique -- 14.5. Glasses rule: embroidering with Wu Huazhuan and her friends -- 14.6. A butterfly needs flowers to live: embroidering a hat -- 14.7. Feng Shui master's patterns: cutting embroidery patterns -- 14.8. Centipedes, dragons, and snakes: Dimen motifs -- 15. Garments -- 15.1. Made in China, by the Kam: introduction to Kam garments in Dimen -- 15.2. Subtle patterns: sewing patterns for a jacket -- 15.3. Who needs tailor's chalk?: Cutting fabric -- 15.4. Not my grandma's sewing machine: sewing a jacket -- Birds in song: sewing an under-apron and calf-wraps -- 15.6. Dragon shoes: making pointed cloth shoes -- 16. "Kamness" in making -- 16.1. Dinner that made us family: how we earned a place by serving the women -- 16.2. The whole package: learning from the lifestyle -- 16.3. Different times, different songs: Kam songs -- 16.4. Dramatic didactics: Kam opera -- 16.5. No nails needed: Kam architecture -- 16.6 Haven no more: impact of industrialization and globalization -- 16.7. Building bridges: hope for the future -- 16.8. Butterfly songs: how the Za found their voice -- Glossary -- Kam vocabulary -- Conversion chart -- Bibliography -- Index -- Acknowledgments. |
| Summary |
Deep in the fir woods of southwestern China, in a village called Dimen, live several women who are masters of many cultural arts. Following the centuries-old lifestyle of their ancestors, they are the living repositories of their civilization. They carry the unwritten history and wisdom of the Kam people in their songs, weave cloth that is smooth and strong, and dye fabric to the richest indigo blue. They devote every free moment to embroidering sleeves, hems, hats, and purses in the bright colors of the natural setting that surrounds the village. Through everyday activities, lessons in craft, |
| Local Note |
eBooks on EBSCOhost EBSCO eBook Subscription Academic Collection - North America |
| Subject |
Women artisans -- China.
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Women artisans. |
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China. |
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Handicraft -- China.
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Handicraft. |
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Dong (Chinese people) -- China -- Guizhou Sheng -- Social life and customs.
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Dong (Chinese people) |
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China -- Guizhou Sheng. |
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Manners and customs. |
| Genre/Form |
Electronic books.
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| Added Title |
Dawn of the butterflies |
| ISBN |
9781527527157 (electronic book) |
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1527527158 (electronic book) |
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1527505537 |
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9781527505537 |
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