2020 Essays

Necessary Particulars: Philosophical Reflections on Making and Knowing with Ms. Fr. 640

Branscum, Olivia Leigh

This essay reflects philosophically on how the Making and Knowing Project engages with Ms. Fr. 640 to gain insight into artisanal epistemology. I draw a distinction between “virtual” and “concrete” modes of investigating the manuscript before arguing that it should be studied using both modes in an interwoven manner. I track the problematic virtual/concrete distinction through some recent scholarship, and I suggest that texts like Ms. Fr. 640, which combine records of craft practice with evidence of engagement in those practices, call for a reevaluation of epistemological categories such as propositional and practical knowledge in order to better understand artisanal ways of knowing.