In Making is Connecting , David Gauntlett argues that, through making things, people engage with the world and create connections with each other. Both online and offline, we see that people want to make their mark on the world, and to make connections. During the previous century, the production of culture became dominated by professional elite producers. But today, a vast array of people are making and sharing their own ideas, videos and other creative material online, as well as engaging in real–world crafts, art projects and hands–on experiences. Gauntlett argues that we are seeing a shift from a ‘sit–back–and–be–told culture′ to a ‘making–and–doing culture′. People are rejecting traditional teaching and television, and making their own learning and entertainment instead. Drawing on evidence from psychology, politics, philosophy and economics, he shows how this shift is necessary and essential for the happiness and survival of modern societies.
Making is Connecting
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"Gauntlett offers a terrific account of how creativity, craft, and community intersect in the 21st century."
Clay Shirky, author of Here Comes Everybody
"Essential reading for media educators. Gauntlett takes us beyond instrumental notions of assessing creative practice or teaching with new media into a more far-reaching and political view of how human beings are finding new ways of making their mark on the world, contributing to culture and 'doing it for ourselves'. In a period where 'experts' are bombarding us with moral panics about 'screen addiction' and 'toxic childhood', usually without any research evidence or attention to the fields of existing literature, Making is Connecting redresses the balance and gives voice to the creative communities, on and offline, too often spoken about from positions of ignorance and suspicion."
Media Education Research Journal
"A very accessible and sound argument centered on creating and sharing as the cornerstones to individual happiness and healthy community in a society saturated with messages imploring and coercing us to do the exact opposite. Academic but accessible, fun with serious supportive argumentation, full of life and exploding with optimism, I'm certain David Gauntlett's Making is Connecting will inspire in you the fire to make, connect, and do!"
Art Threat
"In a beautifully crafted book, [Gauntlett] explains how making things connects us to our world and to each other...Perhaps more academics should be 'craftivists'."
Alison Adam, Salford University
Times Higher Education, "What Are You Reading?"
"Accessible, well constructed, bold and controversial."
Julian McDougall, Newman University College
Times Higher Education, "What Are You Reading?"
"Making is Connecting is an inspired call to recognize the relationship between encouraging creativity and fostering an engaged citizenry. If you want to understand how emerging practices in digital participatory cultures can lead to positive transformations in our individual lives and in our societies, you need to read this book."
Lynn Schofield Clark, University of Denver
"Making is Connecting is a remarkably clear, convincing and engaging work. Perhaps the best thing about this book is the way in which Gauntlett draws together the existing literature in this field of creativity and community (particularly online). The book makes sense of Leadbeater, Anderson, Lanier, Shirky and others and shines a light on their strengths and weaknesses in a lucid and convincing fashion."
Andrew Dubber, Birmingham City University
Clay Shirky, author of Here Comes Everybody
"Essential reading for media educators. Gauntlett takes us beyond instrumental notions of assessing creative practice or teaching with new media into a more far-reaching and political view of how human beings are finding new ways of making their mark on the world, contributing to culture and 'doing it for ourselves'. In a period where 'experts' are bombarding us with moral panics about 'screen addiction' and 'toxic childhood', usually without any research evidence or attention to the fields of existing literature, Making is Connecting redresses the balance and gives voice to the creative communities, on and offline, too often spoken about from positions of ignorance and suspicion."
Media Education Research Journal
"A very accessible and sound argument centered on creating and sharing as the cornerstones to individual happiness and healthy community in a society saturated with messages imploring and coercing us to do the exact opposite. Academic but accessible, fun with serious supportive argumentation, full of life and exploding with optimism, I'm certain David Gauntlett's Making is Connecting will inspire in you the fire to make, connect, and do!"
Art Threat
"In a beautifully crafted book, [Gauntlett] explains how making things connects us to our world and to each other...Perhaps more academics should be 'craftivists'."
Alison Adam, Salford University
Times Higher Education, "What Are You Reading?"
"Accessible, well constructed, bold and controversial."
Julian McDougall, Newman University College
Times Higher Education, "What Are You Reading?"
"Making is Connecting is an inspired call to recognize the relationship between encouraging creativity and fostering an engaged citizenry. If you want to understand how emerging practices in digital participatory cultures can lead to positive transformations in our individual lives and in our societies, you need to read this book."
Lynn Schofield Clark, University of Denver
"Making is Connecting is a remarkably clear, convincing and engaging work. Perhaps the best thing about this book is the way in which Gauntlett draws together the existing literature in this field of creativity and community (particularly online). The book makes sense of Leadbeater, Anderson, Lanier, Shirky and others and shines a light on their strengths and weaknesses in a lucid and convincing fashion."
Andrew Dubber, Birmingham City University
From the Back Cover
In Making is Connecting , David Gauntlett argues that, through making things, people engage with the world and create connections with each other. Both online and offline, we see that people want to make their mark on the world, and to make connections. During the previous century, the production of culture became dominated by professional elite producers. But today, a vast array of people are making and sharing their own ideas, videos and other creative material online, as well as engaging in real–world crafts, art projects and hands–on experiences. Gauntlett argues that we are seeing a shift from a ‘sit–back–and–be–told culture′ to a ‘making–and–doing culture′. People are rejecting traditional teaching and television, and making their own learning and entertainment instead. Drawing on evidence from psychology, politics, philosophy and economics, he shows how this shift is necessary and essential for the happiness and survival of modern societies.
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews
5 of 5 people found the following review helpful
By Elizabeth S. Wells
VINE™ VOICE
Format:Paperback|Amazon Vine™ Review
(What's this?)
This is an exciting book on an interesting and relevant subject, belied, I think, by a dull title, "Making is connecting". But what could David Gauntlett do with the wide subject he was trying to cover?
The compass of this book is vast, so I homed in on something I know, namely, "knitting", intrigued that this even has a mention, however, its inclusion is clarified by a quote from Joanne Turney in her book, "The Culture of Knitting".
Joanne says that knitting "offers a means of creativity, of confidence in one's own ability to "do", as well as occupying a space in which one can just "be".
This is amplifies by the comment on the back of the book, that, "Gauntlett offers a terrific account of how creativity, craft and community intersect in the 21st Century" - [Clay Shirky, author of "Here Comes Everybody"].
Not surprisingly, in the sweep of David Gauntlett's vision of present trends, a parallel is drawn to William Morris and the Arts and Crafts movement. He demonstrates how the contemporary interest in DIY and the "handmade", can be viewed as a resurgence of the arts and crafts ethos in this present century.
As already a part of the "make do and mend" generation - my mother was born 1903, and I was born just after the WWII - I don't know how much I am part of this revolution of independence from reliance on the world of consumerism - but I do know I am in sympathy with it.
Fashioning Technology: A DIY Intro to Smart Crafting (Craft: Projects)William Morris: A Life for Our Time
The compass of this book is vast, so I homed in on something I know, namely, "knitting", intrigued that this even has a mention, however, its inclusion is clarified by a quote from Joanne Turney in her book, "The Culture of Knitting".
Joanne says that knitting "offers a means of creativity, of confidence in one's own ability to "do", as well as occupying a space in which one can just "be".
This is amplifies by the comment on the back of the book, that, "Gauntlett offers a terrific account of how creativity, craft and community intersect in the 21st Century" - [Clay Shirky, author of "Here Comes Everybody"].
Not surprisingly, in the sweep of David Gauntlett's vision of present trends, a parallel is drawn to William Morris and the Arts and Crafts movement. He demonstrates how the contemporary interest in DIY and the "handmade", can be viewed as a resurgence of the arts and crafts ethos in this present century.
As already a part of the "make do and mend" generation - my mother was born 1903, and I was born just after the WWII - I don't know how much I am part of this revolution of independence from reliance on the world of consumerism - but I do know I am in sympathy with it.
Fashioning Technology: A DIY Intro to Smart Crafting (Craft: Projects)William Morris: A Life for Our Time
2 of 2 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback|Amazon Vine™ Review
(What's this?)
This is a really worthwhile overview of whats happening in the online/interactive world of craftmaking today. The whole area has opened up in recent years and many, many young people in particular are getting into hobby knitting and stitching for the first time ever. These are the young people who didn't grow up with learning such crafts as necessity as their parents or grandparents probably did (and may have failed to have passed onto them as a result)- this new generation may consider them a great novelty. This book describes all these new making networks and provides an indepth picture of just what is available out there today and how this has developed. Useful to see this strand of development running alongside the more professional pathways to making via textiles at art school, although some crossover, hopefully, will result.
2 of 2 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback|Amazon Vine™ Review
(What's this?)
A relatively dry text, "Making Is Connecting" explores the idea - that making is connecting : by joining together separate ingredients and components that we are connecting ideas and making a new, unique identity. Though, perhaps, it extends the metaphor too far, it does posit, usefully that the connections we make with other people are a form of creativity, that all art of making is connecting and communication, and that websites, even Facebook status updates are creative. I draw the line a little at the idea that craft, stitching and the subculture of Etsy is much other than bored people stitching - even Tracey Emin - but the sense of community, the comfort and community that comes from this is not dissimilar to social networking, a Friday Night gang, or any other interation of a social circle that reflects the many different elements of our personalities. The version of "me" that exists at a football match or Metallica gig isn't the same version of "me" that clocks into work on a Monday Morning. Perhaps this text - dry and academic as it sometimes is - reflects that we are all millions of people at the same time, and whilst none of us can be all of us all the time, at least some of us, in how we live and what we choose to do, become most of us most of the time, and that in itself is a victory. A good read of potentially limited appeal.
Most Recent Customer Reviews
5.0 out of 5 stars
Linked up for satisfaction
The basic premiss of this book is that people are happier and more involved and engaged with the people around them and generally across the world, and thus more likely to grow,... Read more
Published 1 month ago by Tolkein
5.0 out of 5 stars
Excellent
Bought this to use in my dissertation but it is also a really good book as well. Very interesting book absolutely enjoyed reading it!
Published 15 months ago by Lucy Jennings
2.0 out of 5 stars
Not my cup of tea
Despite being interested in the topic, I found this book difficult to plough through and I confess I didn't make it to the end. Only for those with stamina.
Published 15 months ago by Kevin
4.0 out of 5 stars
Making the connection
This book made the connection for me between my politics and my interest in craft and making things. Read more
Published 17 months ago by Jess
5.0 out of 5 stars
Hearken to the call
I just love this book. It is a wake up call that just seems to resonate and ring true for me just at the moment. Read more
Published 17 months ago by Mr. A. C. Thorne
5.0 out of 5 stars
A clever and timely book
I teach design students who are driven to make, but not so driven to connect. When I attempt to get them to consider the role of craft within society as a form of developing social... Read more
Published 19 months ago by J. Baldwin
4.0 out of 5 stars
A brilliant book, and timely too considering the changes afoot in...
A comprehensive look at the whole maelstrom of how the internet has effectively changed the way we connect in every sphere related to creative endeavours. Read more
Published 20 months ago by Mr. S. R. Dhain
4.0 out of 5 stars
A debatable concept
This book is well-written although in parts it is difficult to read with any enthusiasm. 'Creativity' is a word that has been much abused of late, where every activity from a... Read more
Published 22 months ago by Z. Herbert
4.0 out of 5 stars
making the connections
As someone who makes things I was intrigued to read this book and I did find it fascinating overall. Read more
Published 23 months ago by Green Book Addict Librarian
5.0 out of 5 stars
Get it while it's hot.
I first came across this book at an art gallery in devon. A friend (a digital artist) was giving a talk on a skills-sharing website she has set up to serve a particular community,... Read more
Published 23 months ago by A_I_A
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