As the Editor of the International Journal on Grey Literature, I am very interested in
receiving a submission on Artifact Literature and any/all of the issues associated with that for the Journal.  Please contact me about any ideas.  Instructions to authors are available at:

http://www.mcb.co.uk/portfolio/ijgl/notes.htm

I look forward to hearing from all interested persons.

Julia Gelfand
Univ of Calif, Irvine
Editor, IJGL


Laura Petznick wrote:

> For the attention of Mr Miner:
>
> Further to Mr. Ciotola's excellent response to your search for "artifact
> literature", I have a few suggestions.
>
> First, I cannot personally recommend a single book that would answer all of
> your needs. You seem to be wanting a quick fix for dating all artifacts from
> all periods, places and materials. Mr. Ciotola mentioned Schlereth who would
> serve your purposes well but I would suggest that your students not rely on
> a single volume, but encourage them to seek out their own resource materials
> to help date and describe the history of an object. Archealogical research,
> period pattern books and catalogues, contemporary diaries and letters,
> contemporary prints and paintings all can help to date an object that may
> not neatly fit into someone else's general guide to artifact dating. If an
> artifact appears to date from the American Colonial period, I would consult:
>
> IVOR NOEL HUME's A Guide to Colonial Artifacts of America.  New York:
> Vintage Books, 1969.
>
> This book is the result of many years at Colonial Williamsburg from the
> archealogist's perspective.
>
> For more recent periods, when pattern books and general catalogues were
> published, I would suggest that these comtemporary publications are the
> student's best, first-hand guide to artifacts. Of course, there is no single
> solution, but that I would suggest is all part of the thrill of research.
>
> You mentioned that you found research books dedicated to specific materials.
> While these books may be useful, I think that focusing on the style of a
> period and a location would be more useful in determining the age of an
> object (especially if you cannot identify what it is) than by consulting a
> general book on glass, for example.
>
> In response to your second question, I can understand the difficulty you
> have had in tracking down methodologies for artifact research. It would take
> a whole new thread of conversation to discuss why this is, so I shall leave
> that to someone else. Even so, I would suggest two sources for you:
>
> 1) Zimmerman, Philip D. "Regionalism in American Furniture Studies" in Ward,
> Gerald W. R. ed. Perspectives on American Furniture. New York: W. W. Norton
> & Co., 1988.
>
> 2) Fahy, Anne ed. "Collections Management" in Leicester Readers in Museum
> Studies. London: Routledge, 1995. (I think).
>
> Although Zimmerman focuses his discussion on regional furniture studies, I
> would suggest that his four clearly defined methodologies could readily be
> applied to virtually all types of artifact research; Zimmerman's basic
> approach was applied to furniture, but as objects of material culture and
> social history a table or a chair may be described in terms of its maker,
> materials, age, location of manufacture, provenance just as one might
> approach describing and dating a clay pipe or a silver salver.
>
> While I am unsure if you might find your answer in Fahy's "Collections
> Management", I am quite sure that the issue of methodological approaches to
> artifacts is covered in the Leicester Readers in Museum Studies series. I am
> sorry that I cannot be more specific; my library is packed away at the
> moment.
>
> I sincerely hope that this helps you. I apologise for the long-winded nature
> of my response. All I can offer in my defence is that this is a subject
> about which I feel very strongly... as if you could not tell that for
> yourself!
>
> Kind regards,
> Laura
>
> L.W.S. Petznick, Ph.D.
> 539 Indian Lake Road
> Hendersonville, TN 37075-5221
> 615-824-7371
>
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