Quiet Activism and the New Amateur: The Power of Home and Hobby Crafts

This article contributes to debates about the expanded, and expanding, nature of crafts by exploring the activist potential of amateur, domestic crafts and the quiet activism of everyday making. In contrast to much recent work on the resurgence of interest in DIY craft culture, it takes a historical perspective and argues for the emergence of a new, historically conscious, socially engaged amateur practice. The recently exhibited cross-stitch embroideries of Major Alexis Casdagli and my own memories of my grandmother provide a starting point for exploring the lived experience of home crafts in the first half of the twentieth century. Close analysis of home-craft features from 1930s women's magazines offer a framework for understanding how such marginalized spaces promote agency through new feminine imaginaries. Michel be Certeau's notion of Ia perruque suggests how such devalued activities as crochet and knitting can be envisaged as strategies or tactics that afford agency and shape distinctive social relations, while interviews with two contemporary practitioners provide insight into historical continuities and current responses.