dear all -- here's a summary of the replies i received:

kristina Niedderer <[log in to unmask]> have written her  MA
dissertation on "Hands and Objects: Please Don't Touch" (unpublished). It
consists of three parts:
1) scientific review of the hand include evolution, sensory and motor
system of the hand and its relation to the brain and the development of
human intelligence.
2) review of 3 different artists and their use of the hand in their work:
Pollock for his working method; Joseph Beuys for his use of gesture in his
performances as well as tactile materials; Meret Oppenheim's "Breakfast in
Fur" for her play with touch.
3) the hand in the making of objects, and as medium for realising and
developing imagination.

Jose Antonio  de Oliveira Simoes <[log in to unmask]> had a MSC student who
developed a dissertation thesis (in Portuguese) were he compared different
rapid prototyping techniques and milling of a human hand:
Relvas, Carlos, 2003. Processos de prototipagem rápida no fabrico de
modelos de geometria complexa: estudo realizado sobre o modelo anatómico da
mão. Mestrado em Design Industrial, Departamento de Engenharia Mecânica e
Gestão Industrial, Faculdade de Engenharia da Universidade do Porto.
For those interested in this topic Simoes and Relvas published two papers
in English.

Stan Mauger <[log in to unmask]> wrote me that: “One avenue you may find
useful is the idea of bodily hexis. Pierre Bourdieu links this to personal
habitus, the dispositions that we carry through to practice. Donald Schon
also makes reference to it in discussing implicit knowledge, and
surprisingly, I came across a reference from Michael Polanyi in his essays
on tacit knowledge.”

He sent me the following references:
Bourdieu, Pierre, 1989. In Other Words – Essays Towards a Reflexive
Sociology Trans Adamson, Matthew. Stanford California: Stanford University
Press. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Polanyi, Michael, 1966. The Tacit Dimension. London: Routledge & Kegan Paul.
Schon, Donald, 1984. “The Crisis of Professional Knowledge and Epistemology
of Practice.” In: Christensen and Hansen, eds. 1987. Teaching and the Case
Method. Boston: Harvard School Business Press, pp 241-253.

And he quoted Polanyi (1996) in discussing tacit knowledge:
“Anyone using a probe for the first time will feel its impact against his
fingers and palm. But as we learn to use a probe, or use a stick for
feeling our way, our awareness of its impact on our hand is transformed
into a sense of its point touching the objects we are exploring. This is
how an interpretative effort transposes meaningless feelings into
meaningful ones, and places these at some distance from the original
feeling. We become aware of the feelings in our hand in terms of their
meaning located at the tip of the probe or stick to which we are attending.
This is also shown in the use of a tool. We are attending to the meaning of
its impact on our hands in terms of its effect on the things to which we
are applying it. We may call this the semantic aspect of tacit knowing. All
meaning tends to be displaced away from ourselves, and that is in fact my
justification for using the terms “proximal” and “distal” to describe the
first and second terms of tacit knowing” (Polanyi, 1966, p13).

“ . . . The way we see an object is determined by certain efforts inside
our body, efforts that we cannot feel in themselves. We are aware of these
things going on inside our body in terms of position, shape, and motion of
an object, to which we are attending. In other words we are attending from
these internal processes to the qualities of things outside” (Polanyi,
1966, p13).

Cameron Tonkinwise <[log in to unmask]> wrote me: “A bit off-
topic of design and perhaps artefact but a most stimulating thinking about
the nature of the hand is Jacques Derrida's essay on Heidegger”:
“Geschlecht 2: Heidegger's Hand.” Trans. John P. Leavey Jr. In: John
Sallis, ed. 1987. Deconstruction and Philosophy. Chicago.
Another reference by Cameron is:
McCullough, Malcolm. 1996. Abstracting Craft : the Practiced Digital Hand.
Cambridge, Massachusetts: MIT Press.

Luca Guerrini <[log in to unmask]> advised me to see the works of
Andre' Leroi-Gourhan, among these (both translated from French):
"Evoluzione e Tecniche" and "Il Gesto e la Parola." Leroi-Gourhan developed
profound analysis of technology through an in-depth study about the
relationship between intellectual and manual activities.

Ken Friedman <[log in to unmask]> sent me the following reference:
Pelle, Ehn, and Jonas Löwgren, eds. Design [x] research: Essays on
interaction design as knowledge construction. (Available free as .pdf file
from Malmo University Electronic Publishing: www.bit.mah.se/publications).
Summary: “How can design be performed as a means of constructing relevant
knowledge for other designers, as opposed to performing design in order to
create new products? This question is addressed in nine essays by PhD
students from interaction design, product design, and human-computer
interaction, providing perspectives and ideas for the ongoing debate on the
relation between design and research.”

best regards -- Fatina

Dr. Fatina Saikaly
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