The Story of Things

Description

‘The Story of Things' inaugurated an external partnership among the Department of English and Related Literature, Fairfax House Museum and Knavesmire Primary School. It established a model for collaboration with schools that Fairfax House will be able to apply to other schools in the region and in the nation through online learning tools and education resources. Dr Chloe Wigston Smith taught 120 pupils across years 4 and 5 and then oversaw their visit to Fairfax House Museum. Following the visit, she instructed the pupils in how to create fictional stories based on the museum's objects.The project is inspired by eighteenth-century object narratives published in Britain and early America. In this type of early novel, objects such as coins, clothes and carriages functioned as protagonists (who often are given the ability to narrate their own stories). Object-narratives proved a significant influence on the invention of children’s literature in the eighteenth century in that they imagined a world in which inanimate objects could function as thinking beings. Late eighteenth-century versions were aimed at children and offered instruction on how to care for possessions and other moral lessons. Dr Wigston Smith has previously published on these genres in her journal article, ‘Clothes without Bodies: Objects, Humans and the Marketplace in Eighteenth-Century It-Narratives and Trade Cards’ in Eighteenth-Century Fiction 23, no. 2 (2010-11) and her book, Women, Work and Clothes in the Eighteenth-Century Novel (Cambridge University Press, 2013; Paperback 2016). The project draws also on her ongoing research and expertise in thing theory and material culture studies. The project website (currently in development) will extend it further into the community by providing a response area in which young persons and adults can produce their own stories based on the best models offered by Knavesmire pupils. It will also include other teacher resources.

Period	Jun 2017 → Jul 2017
Held at	Fairfax House, York