3.2 Pilot studies (Understanding the craftsman)
3.2.1 Pilot study I: Bamboo basket making process
North Eastern part of India is abundant in craft and bamboo industries (Fig.3.5). In an article Prof. A G Rao (1994) speaks about the bamboo craft industry in India. The author states ‘a well-crafted bamboo product stands out as an example of human ingenuity’. The author describes about his experience of bamboo crafts and its influence as a craft in many parts of India especially North eastern part of India. The author raises several questions in this article one of which is ‘Can we integrate knowledge, skills and attributes of bamboo craft in our education?’ The author describes the influence of bamboo in education, bamboo in craft industry and bamboo as a resource material.
The influence of craft into Japanese culture can be seen in their education where origami paper craft is imparted as a training to students. Prof. Rao presents a career map (Fig.3.6) for imparting bamboo craft in education in India. This can be inculcated to other craft products to provide various creative idea among the youths. Since bamboo craft is a sustainable product, so making it part of the education and incorporating it a secondary profession would help in uplifting certain sectors of people in a society. The main aim of this research was to study the skills involved in the crafts making. So to achieve this feat a number of craft products were to be studied and the stakeholders involved in them also has to be observed. The pilot study is an attempt to study the log lasting tradition of bamboo crafts in the craft sector.
The study was carried out in the Student Activity Center of Indian Institute of Technology Guwahati, India where a workshop for the bamboo craft was organized by SPIC MACAY, which is a non- political nationwide voluntary movement in India that organizes programs of classical music and dance, folk arts, crafts, yoga, classic cinema screenings, heritage walks, etc. inside school and college campuses throughout the world to make students more aware about Indian and world heritage (retrieved from http://www.spicmacay.com/, 2018).
Fig.3.5: Influence of crafts in North-Eastern part of India (Source: Internet) Bamboo craft in Education
Craft in school education
Craft as a career Craft as a hobby
ITI courses -Diplomas -Degrees
Books, videos, kits etc TV Programmes
Exhibitions Competitions Awards for crafts
Training centres in urban areas, for school teachers, housewives etc.
Fig.3.6: Bamboo craft in education (Rao. A.G, 1994)
To extract the tacit knowledge of the craftsmen few experiments involving four craftsmen were performed when they were working with bamboo. One of the craftsmen is expert in the bamboo basket making and the others were learner. The expert craftsmen were able to do around 30 baskets working 4 hours in a day. The expert craftsman involved in the making of the bamboo basket had a variety of baskets designs in his mind. The simplest of the basket was the basket tray which was flat in nature and was direct combinations of different strips of the basket in a flat arrangement. The only difference in the pattern occurred when the walls of the basket was made. This require to turn the bamboo strip in a certain direction which made the wall perpendicular the flat surface previously.
The pilot study involved observation of the craftsman when he is making the craft. Certain unstructured questions were also asked by the researcher during the study.
Fig.3.7 a show a craftsman working with the bamboo to make a basket. The master craftsmen use bamboo strips which are having a certain thickness suitable for the particular basket.
a. b.
Fig.3.7: a. Bamboo basket making process b. Paper envelop making process (Author generated) To start a bamboo basket, the master craftsmen followed a series of steps:
1. Choose the particular thickness of the bamboo.
2. Dip the bamboo in the water. Here water acts as a coolant to soften the bamboo for easy folding.
3. Fold the bamboo into different steps so that the final outcome is strong enough to hold different objects.
The strips were cut into a certain thickness required for making the basket. The length of the strips was also maintained. The strips were colored into different colors for an aesthetic look to the basket.
Natural colors were used for the coloring. Traditional tools like sickle was used in the cutting of the bamboo. The different leaners, here four numbers, tried to learn from the master. The miniature bending of the bamboo at certain edges were little difficult for the learners to grasp. But with the practice they were also able to perform it.
Understanding the craftsman (Unstructured Interview with the craftsman and learners):
The study was carried out in an environment which was not the usual one for the craftsman. But the master craftsman was comfortable in the environment. The materials needed for the craft was bamboo, a sickle for cutting the bamboo.
a b
Fig. 3.8 a. Bamboo strips and b. sickle (Author generated)
It was observed that the craftsman was doing the craft and by seeing him the other learners were able to perform the step. The difficulties faced by the learners was address by the physical action of performing and doing the crafts by the master craftsman. The bamboo strips were dissected into a certain thickness was the master craftsman was able to perform easily. When asked why he answered the difficulties by performing the craft. The craftsman said:
‘By observing, the learner can easily grasp the idea, which I have learned from by forefathers. I wanted the learners to give a first-hand experience with the crafts, that is the reason I want them to make the and practice the craft by themselves with their own hand.’
It was also observed that the learners behaved like apprenticeship under the master craftsman to learn the craft. One of the learners said:
‘It became easy for me to get learn the craft first-hand. I was very excited to get my first craft of my own hands’
This was a significant observation regarding the research question raised earlier in the chapter. To find the possible opportunities to capture the embedded tacit knowledge we moved to second case study.
Some of the inference was drawn based upon the observation. Table.3.1 shows some knowledge which was extracted from the bamboo model.
Table.3.1: Some application of the tacit knowledge observed in the pilot study Sl
No.
Operation Tacit knowledge used Tacit knowledge
captured in knowledge system Lessons learnt Learning by
doing
Unique property 1 Craftsman starting with
‘Jati’ bamboo
Knowledge of physical and material
Choosing the accurate bamboo
Touch and feel of bamboo
Material property
behaviour of bamboo 2 Cutting bamboo to
approximate sizes
Understanding of different sizes of bamboo
Cutting to accurate size
Size and thickness of cut pieces
Size of the bamboo 3 Builds up the form of
the basket by stitching the primary and secondary strips
Understand and mold the preferred shape
Moulding accurately by hand
Stitching exactly like craft
Stitching shape or curve
and gap between the strips 4 Unconsciously makes
error in the craft which gives a unique shape of the basket
Accounts the human error and tolerances
Minimize the error
Unique shape of basket
Shape of the basket
Based on the skills of the craftsman a variety of baskets and craft items are classified. The classification was done according to the different features found in each of the craft products. In this classification very less, tacit knowledge was captured. Based upon the extracted data the ontology of the crafts domain was developed. There were various tools available for the development of the ontology. Here Protégé (2014) is used to develop the ontology model. Protégé is a free, open source ontology editor and knowledge-based framework software hoisted by Stanford University. Fig. 3.9 shows the ontological model developed for the craft domain.
The pilot study was a brief understanding of the bamboo craft practice. This understanding motivated to go for full experimental understanding of the craftsman and the tacit knowledge they possess to do the craft practice. Since the craft practice is very old and primitive in nature, so covering all the aspect is very difficult and out of the scope for this research. So, our focus is on very limited craft practices, which can help to understand the knowledge embedded in them.
a b
Fig.3.9 a. Ontology of Craft domain in the Protégé software b. the asserted model representation of the ontology model developed
3.2.2 Pilot study-2: Paper envelop making process for mentally disabled persons