What Objects Mean and How They Mean It (TURAN & SCHAMBERGER)

Material objects as facilitating environments: the Palestinian diaspora

(a) This article focuses on the significance of material objects for Palestinians in diaspora in terms of their collective identity and memory. It is a study that illustrates how objects as symbols of a person’s collective group (“object legacy”- when the object is passed down with continuity from one generation to the next) which help the creation of a sheltering and nurturing environment, named as “facilitating environment”. With the use of 4 examples of Palestinian Americans living in New York City, they explain the materiality of objects and the meanings that are associated with objects prevent failing memory and how it sustains a collective identity that are generated by materialistic characteristics not by social value. It started off with a girl’s account, Haim Sabat, her life story, how herself and her family maintained a sense of “homeland” through objects (Bethlehemic furnishing of the house). TURAN later used the quotes from Said and Appadurai to support this argument. He also suggested approaching objects from two angles, one is psychological- how objects function in the formation of collective identity and how these objects are interpreted differently through association to other people and the other is addressing the association between the objects and materiality. He extended this argument further seeing how these two approaches infer social meaning and thought the emotions that are provoked are important for individuals to make a discernment of who they are. The study has used the snowball technique to locate participants in the Middle Eastern diaspora communities of New York City, the Palestinians. Participants are selected from families who experienced dislocation and possessed objects that tied him or her to the family history and the experience of dislocation. The audio and video interviews ranged from one and a half hours to three and a half hours and questions about the meaning of objects, their degree of attachments to the objects, and degree of significance of their collective identity in their daily lives were asked. I am convinced by the author’s argument because of the multi-dimensional way (audios and videos) of doing interviews to find out information about relationship of objects to their thought of homeland as well as the snow ball sampling which guarantees the pool of interviewees are legit and of good quality.

(b) TURAN has done a good job in stating out the research problem and methods to tackle this psychological research. He has also first theorized the objects (what the objects are, how collective memory are constructed, how objects are related to self and this self-cultivation happens in two dimensions: differentiation (which eventually develops individuality) and integration (which eventually develops relatedness) in the framework of Winnicott’s theory of “transitional objects”. “Transitional objects” are supposed to disappear after it performs its function of providing security and comfort and provide a sense of continuity on both a personal and generational level. The objects have a developmental function when they are passed down to succeeding generations and become objects of legacy. These objects glue individuals together and then give a collective group identity which provides a sheltering and nurturing environment, in what Winnicott calls it “facilitating environments”. This environment not only gives a social value to collective identity but also a material and emotional dimension to it. TURAN provides insights and details in looking at how objects can help establish self identity and the relation aspect of objects as transitional to the individuals. He expands the objective into smaller categories for reader to understand it more tangibly. The interviews are conducted and analyzed in a way that either support, oppose or suggest a hybrid argument to Winnicott’s theory.

(c) Two Questions for Meaning Thoughts

a. It is funny how the different objects can be interpreted in associating individuals to homeland for different reasons. Can we still interpret the objects without asking them but by mere observation of their reactions to the objects?

b. Because how different individuals come from different origins, their interpretation of objects to their identity and association to homeland is different, is it possible to have a more systematic manner (spectrum) to categorize these accounts? I am particularly interested in how Christianity affected these Palestinians in seeing their identity. It will be great if TURAN explores this too in his study.

Living in a material world: object biography and transnational lives

(a) Through Australian Journeys Gallery at the National Museum of Australia, it explores 2 examples of object biography, they are Mrs. Guna Kinne’s Latvian national dress and Minh Tam Nguyen’s Dàn tre bamboo musical instrument. This gallery explores transnational character of Australian experience. It also traces the passage of people to, from and across the Australian continent and examines how migrants, sojourners, tourists and travellers have built and maintained connections between places in Australia and places overseas through things, images, media and text. Comparing to TURAN’s article, SCHAMBERGER takes a more humanitarian way of discussing diaspora by introducing the term “object biography” examines anartefact’s life history to ‘address the way social interactions involving people and objects create meaning’ and to understand how these meanings ‘change and are renegotiated through the life of an object’.. What contributes to this is “object knowledge”- embodied understandings of the object/world that constitute the foundation for any understanding of lived experience. SCHAMBERGER has used a very easy story-telling manner to talk about 2 “object biographies”, how Guna and Minh both travelled to different parts of the world before they lastly settled in Australia. Instead of seeing these flows of ideas, people and practices in relation to the object as distinct, SCHAMBERGER is suggesting rather a growing body of work when different things and people are constantly in motion, and shaping each other. He has introduced the method of “object biography”- research method in the first paragraph to find out how objects participate in, shape and express transnational historical experience. I am convinced by the author’s argument because after reading the two “object biographies”, my perspective of seeing object connecting places and people is real and alive. What he suggested earlier to create a more fluid object from turning it more objective to subjective is my experience of understanding after reading these two biographies.

(b) The author has done well in making difficult and abstract concepts that relate to transnational and object in nature easy for readers to understand and follow. It feels like reading a fiction which has made objects alive through the two biographies. Even though the research question and method are clearly stated, reader can encounter problems of having too many events all jammed together and eventually loses track of how exactly the object is affected by the events, and how the object is also affecting the events that happened. The relationship looks ambiguous sometimes because it is difficult to draw clear lines between these two variables. Personally speaking, after some major events stated out, I really like how the author inserts a picture that helps to keep me on track. The creativity of making an object alive by exploring social interactions involving people and objects create meaning and to understand how these meanings “change and are renegotiated through the life of an object” is simply mind-blowing. Because this research is done in a humanistic way without much scientific methodology, the results sometimes cause me to wonder if it is accurate or not but on the other hand, I realized because it is more like a fluid relationship, it is hard to use numbers or scientific methodology to carry out this study.

(c) Two Questions for Meaningful Thoughts

a. Even though it is taken a more humanistic way of conducting this study, is it possible to increase the accuracy of the results? Perhaps incorporating some scientific methodology into the study to measure some aspects that can’t be measured before?

b. Quoting from the article, “cultural forms always have two conflicting elements: they are

often made up of bits and pieces taken from many places on the one hand, but these are quickly formed into a coherent whole on the other…”, even though the definition is offered, is there tangible example to explain this abstract idea? Better explanation for “non-linear logics that create a hybrid material world, and in turns, how this hybridity shapes human subjectivity” is definitely needed.