Holding on through cloth
Memory Object (FAYETTEVILLE): “My childhood undershirt. I have an cotton undershirt from when I was four years old. It is very soft and is white with tiny blue flowers on it. It has been in my underwear drawer for as long as I can remember. When I went away to college, I often used it as a handkerchief when my allergies flared up due to our old and musty dorm ventilation. It is hard to explain what it means to me, but I like to be reminded that I once was a small child — the undershirt seems to connect me to that childhood.”
Cultural approaches to material culture insist on the notion of objects as holders of important cultural meaning, as well as on a mutual constitution in its relationship with subjects. In this sense, the excerpt above allows us to appreciate how a simple cotton undershirt can, in fact, do a lot of “cultural work.”
Get Soledad Altrudi’s stories in your inbox
Join Medium for free to get updates from this writer.
The most notable is that this object is connecting this person directly to his childhood in a very affective and nostalgic way. Indeed, this very simple piece of fabric is evoking heartfelt feelings associated to a time of nurture, safety and comfort which usually characterize the first home an individual lives in. The very materiality of this memory object seems to reinforce those warm sensations, not only because its sole purpose was to keep its user warm as a kid, but also because the description above highlights its very soft and delicate texture.
This sense of care and protection that the object emanates also becomes clear when he (I have chosen to imagine the owner as a male) writes that he would use this undershirt during times of illness while in college, when he needed to care for himself, on his own, away from that first home and away from those primary caretakers that possibly were his parents. In this context, the undershirt is also extending the connections between them in time, especially during moments that can be trying and alienating, such as being away for college.
Lastly, this object is connecting this person to a past self, to his younger self, and thus acts as a nostalgic reminder of something that was and that can never be again because it is simply not possible to revert to that time, to those emotions and to those relations as they were. The power of this object is such that this person is not able to dispose of it, as that would represent severing that connection to what was. Losing the past that has attached itself to the fibers of the cotton would mean losing a part of this person’s sense of self.
All of this is why the cotton undershirt sits in his underwear drawer, mostly hidden but always there, accessible to its subject in times of physical or emotional need.
written on April 16, 2018.
