These Are My People: an Ethnography of Quiltcon
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University of Nebraska - Lincoln DigitalCommons@University of Nebraska - Lincoln Textiles, Merchandising and Fashion Design: Textiles, Merchandising and Fashion Design, Dissertations, Theses, & Student Research Department of Spring 3-2021 These Are My People: An Ethnography of QuiltCon Kristin Barrus University of Nebraska-Lincoln, [email protected] Follow this and additional works at: https://digitalcommons.unl.edu/textilesdiss Part of the American Art and Architecture Commons, American Material Culture Commons, American Popular Culture Commons, Contemporary Art Commons, Cultural History Commons, Family, Life Course, and Society Commons, Fiber, Textile, and Weaving Arts Commons, Industrial and Product Design Commons, Museum Studies Commons, Quantitative, Qualitative, Comparative, and Historical Methodologies Commons, Social and Cultural Anthropology Commons, Social History Commons, Sociology of Culture Commons, Women's History Commons, and the Women's Studies Commons Barrus, Kristin, "These Are My People: An Ethnography of QuiltCon" (2021). Textiles, Merchandising and Fashion Design: Dissertations, Theses, & Student Research. 19. https://digitalcommons.unl.edu/textilesdiss/19 This Thesis is brought to you for free and open access by the Textiles, Merchandising and Fashion Design, Department of at DigitalCommons@University of Nebraska - Lincoln. It has been accepted for inclusion in Textiles, Merchandising and Fashion Design: Dissertations, Theses, & Student Research by an authorized administrator of DigitalCommons@University of Nebraska - Lincoln. THESE ARE MY PEOPLE: AN ETHNOGRAPHY OF QUILTCON by Kristin Barrus A THESIS Presented to the Faculty of The Graduate College at the University of Nebraska In Partial Fulfillment of Requirements For the Degree of Master of Arts Major: Textiles, Merchandising & Fashion Design Under the Supervision of Professor Claire Nicholas Lincoln, Nebraska March 2021 THESE ARE MY PEOPLE: AN ETHNOGRAPHY OF QUILTCON Kristin Barrus, M.A. University of Nebraska, 2021 Advisor: Claire Nicholas This thesis presents the first ethnography of QuiltCon, the annual fan and artist convention for quiltmakers who identify with and participate in a social phenomenon called the Modern Quilt Movement (MQM) within the 21st century quilt world. QuiltCon (QC) is one product of this movement. This study considers the following questions: What kinds of people attend QC, and what types of experiences and encounters do they expect at the convention? What needs are met at QC for this subset of quiltmakers who attend and for the greater community of Modern quiltmakers? What role does QC play in cementing the identity and core values of Modern quiltmakers and the MQM? This cultural description provides a snapshot of the MQM and QC through the eyes of a long-time quilt group whose members identify as Modern quilters, traveling from another state to attend QC 2020 in Austin, Texas, USA. As a member of this group, I am a practicing Modern quiltmaker or cultural “insider,” both observing and experiencing the convention as a fan. In fan studies, this hybrid status is referred to as an “acafan”: An academic researcher studying the phenomenon of which she is a part. This social scientific and anthropological study utilizes qualitative research methods, with an arts-based, constructivist/interpretivist epistemology within the critical framework of quilt history, women’s studies and fan studies. QC 2020 attendees participated in an in-person fan pilgrimage as a physical manifestation of an online community, which included demonstrations of communitas, permission and validation, as well as several examples of celebrity interaction. QuiltCon as a girlfriend getaway included feminist actions through self-labeling, play, the politics of display, and the consumer business of Modern quiltmaking. Results include a discussion of QC’s evolution to an iconic, peak experience for enacting and reflecting the ethos of the MQM (defined as a person, a style, the approach, and the community), particularly for those who attend, irrespective of tension-filled and/or perceived cultural definitions by which Modern quiltmaking practice is or has been defined. Keywords: communitas, ethnography, fan studies, Modern quiltmaking, pilgrimage, women’s studies Copyright 2021, Kristin Barrus DEDICATION AND ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS “But why paint or flute the rim of a pot? Why decorate one’s home? One’s body? More than that, it seems remarkable enough that a species would add marks or symbolic features to functional artifacts, that it would, for example, carve or paint depictions of animals on the walls or doorposts of a house, but why should these be ‘beautiful’ or ‘decorative’ in addition to being merely fearsome or brightly colored? Faced with the overwhelming evidence that people everywhere make and respond to the arts, the ethologist would have to presuppose that the arts must have survival value.” Ellen Dissanayake, 1988 “Let us take up again this study of art in our society with the hope that the Gospel of Beauty may dispel much of the ugliness which grips the [human] race. Remembering always that it is our privilege to flood the world with the beautiful and good.” Alice Merrill Horne, 1920 “When a woman sits down to write, all eyes are on her. The woman who is turning others into the object of her gaze is herself already an object of the gaze. Woman, the original Other, is always being looked at and looked over. A woman sees herself being seen. Clutching her pencil, she wonders how ‘the discipline’ will view the writing she wants to do. Will it be seen as too derivative of male work? Or too feminine? Too safe? Too risky? Too serious? Or not serious enough? Many eyes bore in on her, looking to see if she will do better or worse than men, or at least as well as other women.” Ruth Behar & Deborah Gordon, 1996 Dedicated to my fourteen-year-old daughter Zoe, so that she might always see what strong women look like. Many thanks to my advisor at UNL, Dr. Claire Nicholas, without whom this quite possibly would have remained a puddle of words on the floor drowning me, and for reflections from my committee members Professor Emeritus and Chair Emeritus Michael James, M.F.A., Dr. Marin Hanson, and Dr. Mary Alice Casto. Thank you to the MQG for your full support before you even knew me, and for the IQM’s fellowship award which assisted my travel. For the women who allowed me to record our philosophical discussions on QuiltCon and the state of the quilt world, thank you for trusting me. For my neighbors Stephanie Lutz, who checked out endless books from the BYU library for me, and Kristen Crockett, who copy edited my final draft, thank you. To my Sew Night friends, if there are no words to describe your contribution to this thesis and my life, then why did this end up so long? I have always been surrounded by amazing women who inspire me to love and to make. And to my husband Paul, who exhibited true marital equality in both support and love for me and this project. Your sacrifices for my quilt journey have equaled mine in child rearing. TABLE OF CONTENTS Abstract Dedication and Acknowledgements Chapter 1 Conceptual Framework 1 A Quilt History Primer Origins of The Modern Quilt Guild and QuiltCon Fandom’s Home in the Modern Quilt Movement Research Questions Chapter 2 Literature Review 24 Quilt Studies and Disciplinary Silences Women’s Studies and Quilts Connecting Fan Studies and the Quilt World Chapter 3 Methodology 41 Epistemology and Texts Researcher Positionality and Reflexivity Entering the Field Data Analysis Validity Limitations and Future Research Chapter 4 Upon Arrival: Navigating the Show Layout 62 Physical Areas and Activities: Steering Through the First Day A Community of Pilgrims/Communitas, Permission/Validation, and Celebrity Chapter 5 These Are My People 74 Two Groups of Attendees Appearance and Self Performance Convention Pilgrimage QuiltCon’s Effect on Time Pervasive Curiosity Expectation to Learn The Business of QuiltCon Chapter 6 Communitas and Affect 109 Community Sensibilities Quilt Show: Community on Display Quilt Show: Community in Motion The Politics of a Modern Display Elements of a Modern Quilt Examples of the QuiltCon 2020 Juried Show Juried Show Analysis Chapter 7 Female Empowerment: Let’s Play 136 Gaining Permission, Validating a Movement The Prevalence of Comparison Fangirls and Fandom Abound Three Celebrity Surprises Chapter 8 Conclusion: The QuiltCon Generation 163 QuiltCon as Icon Quilt World Tensions QuiltCon Evolution Conclusion Appendix A Reference List 174 Appendix B Thesis Timeline 183 Appendix C Thesis Expert Interviewees 184 Appendix D Digital Map of Convention Center 185 Appendix E Sample Pages From QuiltCon 2020 Catalog 186 Appendix F IRB Certification and Consent 189 1 CHAPTER 1 CONCEPTUAL FRAMEWORK Modern quiltmaking is today’s iteration of a long-standing “freewheeling” tradition in American quiltmaking referred to by Berlo (Berlo & Crews, 2003) as the place where, “improvisation, asymmetry and experimentation are the norm,” using “off-beat color placement and manipulation of textile patterns” going back over 200 years (pp. 5-6). Quiltmaking is also big business in the consumer craft world today. In 2017, seven to 10 million people spent nearly $4 billion in the mainstream U.S. quilt market (Quiltmaking in America, 2017). A growing portion of that market is made up of materials and people focused on Modern quiltmaking. The Modern Quilt Movement (MQM) of the 21st century is a complex, emerging, and sometimes marginalized