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Slides for final project

Week 9: Traditional Practices

Apologies for the format - I can't figure out Blogger this week. My input screen looks like html code for some reaason and I'm not a coder lol. Videos: I must say the videos this week were personally inspiring. I had day-dreams of leaving my job and becoming a rope maker or something of the like. From age 12 to 25 my job was a farmer. From 25 to now, 38 I’ve been a teacher. I have a friend who has become a part time blacksmith, which arose from a hobby. He has his own forge and classes come to take part and learn. Dancing braids is definitely something I’d like to do someday with students. Personally, I’d like to investigate the math a bit deeper. Watching the Vest-ed Interest video about sheep wool and making clothing seemed like a nice way to address the environmental impacts of the modern clothing industry. That being one of the math for social justice issues in our previous course. I find it relates to traditional kamik and mitt making in the NWT. From experience handmade mitts are much warmer and flexible than their industry made counterparts. I remember a simple pair of rabbit fur mittens being the most comfortable way to keep my hands warm walking around town in temps that went to the negative forties. So from my experience I tend to use handmade items for winter as practicality and as an added benefit it has less environmental impacts. Activity: I must say, I learned a lot just ripping strips from old fabrics. I figured I’d need to use scissors to get nice straight even widths but I only needed my hands.

I found the braiding process quite soothing. It would be something I could do to let my mind unwind. The act of ripping the strips from the fabric was also a bit of a stress reliever. I thought about how there could be so many science experiments that could come from rope making and braiding. For instance, how does the strength of one fabric strip compare to three strips braided together? Is the relation linear or something else? Other investigable question could be: How does friction between strands contribute to the overall strength of a braided rope? What is the relationship between the diameter of a rope and its load-bearing capacity? What mathematical models can describe the braiding patterns and their impact on rope strength? Article: This week I read the APTN article ‘The spirit of the medicine will lead us back’: How Avis O’Brien is guiding Elders to weave their first cedar hats By Anna McKenzie. It describes Avis ‘Nalaga’ O’Brien’s journey to and experience with teaching We Wai Kai and We Wai Kum elders how to weave their first cedar hats. Twelve years prior Avis was feeling disconnected from her culture but started learning how to weave from her sister. At the start of her weaving journey she still wanted nothing to do with it or her culture. However, the healing power of the cedar began to make her interested in her culture. Today she describes, “It’s like we’re giving back these Elders something that was taken to them, taken from them through our history,” she says. “It’s pretty magical.” One elder, Wasden, “says she believes cedar is “who we are and where we come from. It’s entwined in everything we do — from birth on a cedar mat, to death in a cedar box. It’s used for potlatches, for skirts, wreaths, head pieces. It was used for storage, cooking, blankets, mats, and even personal hygiene.” My question this week is: What science questions do you see coming from exploring these traditional practices like weaving?

Week 8

 This week's activity engaged me in a predictable struggle lol. I have difficulties with orienting the paper correctly. I wish the people in such videos didn’t hold up their paper and turn it all around for us to see until they are done. Simply, fold then flip or rotate in the most efficient way possible. This would leave me guessing less. Although I did get the Miura Ora Origami folds after the third attempt. Interesting math here might be how efficient the new structure is at compacting the surface area. 

I read Highly Unlikely Triangles and Other Impossible Figures in Bead Weaving by Fisher, G. (2015). Gwen’s inspiration for her woven beaded sculptures came from Oscar Reutersvard’s 1934 Impossible Triangle. Impossible triangles are a “two-dimensional drawing that represents three straight beams with square cross sections, and the beams appear to meet at right angles.” (p. 99) Impossible polygons are a natural extension of this optical illusion. 

(Fisher, 2015, p. 99)

Gwen notes that the flexibility of weaving beads removes the optical illusion of the 2D drawings. This is why she refers to her creations as unlikely triangles and polygons instead of impossible. The beading medium allows for techniques like turns and twists or varying sizes and directions. As well as curvature which removes the straight edges of the 2D drawings. Other techniques with this medium include strategic use of bead size, colors, and placements. Bead color can be used to show paths, lines, faces, and vertices. 

(Fisher, 2015, p. 102)

A stop that came to me was caused by the uniqueness of the medium and the techniques which allowed for a different take on the impossible triangle versus the 2D paper. As well, as when Gwen mentioned how graphic designer M.C. Escher used the impossible triangle in some of his drawings. The contrast between 2D paper and 3D woven bead sculptures cause me to think of Marshall McLuhan's “the medium is the message”. “Each medium, independent of the content it mediates, has its own intrinsic effects which are its unique message.” (McLuhan, E) The beading medium allows for a new take on what paper says are impossible constructions. 

This kind of flows to Gwen’s desire to make a highly unlikely dodecahedron that shows the ten distinct paths (loops) that occur when moving through the twists and turns of the medium. She referred to this as passing through levels of hierarchy. 

(Fisher, 2015, p. 105)

I also was drawn to the uniqueness of the mediums, and the possible messages that come from each, when I watched the videos. In particular Yackel, who said “wallpaper patterns are realized through the dyeing process”. I appreciated the uniqueness of techniques and limitations that come with the medium, 2D paper is not infinite like the patterns it is trying to capture. Her use of the words constraints and resists - the tightness/clamping of the cloth prevents the dye from entering the cloth - both highlight the uniqueness of the medium. It is also fun to think of the folds as allowing a 2D paper to briefly enter the 3D world, which was similar to Gwen’s mention of passing through levels of hierarchy. 

(Yackel, 2020)

References:

McLuhan, E. (2024). Commonly asked questions about McLuhan – the estate of Marshall McLuhan. Ginkgo Press. https://www.marshallmcluhan.com/common-questions/