Remaking the World: Modeling in Human Experience

Modeling - building, operating, collecting models of all kinds - involves people from many walks of life. From "folk" to highly trained professionals, from skilled artisans to dreamers, modeling is an important means of self-expression and of contact with and understanding of the world. In Remaking the World, James Roy King weaves together strands of thought creating a tapestry that mirrors John Dewey's pragmatism of sufficiencies. King uses the concept of activity sets - relatively stable combinations of activities that characterize every large-scale human enterprise - to explain how modeling can help people make sense of the world around them. The author also looks at working with small sizes and dealing with a variety of technical details, problems related to collecting and displaying models, and their commercial and aesthetic aspects. Appendixes give information about manufacturers of kits and modeling organizations.