How Textile Communicates

Ganaele Langlois is Associate Professor in the Department of Communication and Media Studies at York University, Canada.

• Introduction: Textile as CommunicationWinding BackTextile as a MediumTextile Making as MediatingTextile Making and PowerDecolonizing Media and CommunicationBook OverviewPart 1: Communicative Power1. Unraveling Textile from Commodity to CommunicationA Plural MediumTextile as Communication Medium: Historical PointersTwo Common Understandings of Communication through Textile: as Representation and InformationTowards a Third Aspect: textile as binding worlds through space and timeGlobal Textile, or Communication as Expressive PowerTextile, a Medium of Struggle2. Quechua TextilityPre-Columbian Textiles: Media and PowerIndigenous Identities in Contemporary PeruThe Revival of Quechua TextilesConfronting AppropriationPart 2: Technology and Imagination3. Jacquard and the Creativity of ExtensionsThe Jacquard Mechanism, Automation and Digital MediaWeaving Digital ImagesWeaving as Extension4. Communicating Across the AbyssOf the Meanings, Symbols and Patterns in Diasporic TextileMathematics, Rhythms and SignsThe Values of MakingPart 3: Transformative Entanglements5. Reweaving the InterfaceDomestic Textiles and PowerMarking SubjectsReading through the Lines: The Evanescent MakerPortable Technologies of Making“Where Am I going?”: Creative Meandering6. Kené, or the Promise of UnknowingShipibo-Conibo Textiles and Perspectival AnthropologyKené in the Global MarketDelineating the Space of Unknowing and PotentialsBack to the BasicsPart 4: Cosmomedia7. Cosmomedia - the Tale of Two IndigosCosmotechnics and Ecosophical MediaCombinations and Recombinations: Indigo dyeing and the making of worldsColonizing IndigoIndigo and Collectives of Humans and Non-HumansJapanese Indigo and Natural Dyes as CosmomediaConclusion: The Shape of Things to Come

A major contribution to intercultural and decolonial studies as it examines how the communicative capacities of textile have been taken for granted across boundaries, borders, disciplines and technologies.