Dear Michael,

Several books by Daniel Miller explore the domain of material artifacts and cultural anthropology:

Miller, Daniel. 1998. Material Culture; Why Some Things Matter. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.

Miller, Daniel, ed. 2005. Materiality. Durham, North Carolina; Duke University Press.

Miller, Daniel. 2008. The Comfort of Things. Cambridge: Polity Press.

Miller, Daniel. 2009. Stuff. Cambridge: Polity Press.

To get a sense of how these questions work on different levels and scales, I recommend a new study by David Doris:

Doris, David T. 2011. Vigilant Things: On Thieves, Yoruba Anti-Aesthetics, and the Strange Fates of Ordinary Objects in Nigeria. Seattle: University of Washington Press.

The issue of how objects take on meaning and store is necessarily a story of the web of human interactions, activities, and participations in which the object plays a role. Catharina Blomberg wrote a book on samurai swords that examines the single artifact of the sword from multiple perspectives that address, making, use, and meaning:

Blomberg, Catharina. 1994. The Heart of the Warrior. Sandgate, Kent: The Japan Library.

The great sociologist Patrice Flichy noted often that all technologies are social technologies. His book on communication systems, networks, and the cultures into which they grow and around which clultures take new shape examine aspects of your question at a systems level.

Flichy, Patrice. 1995. Dynamics of Modern Communication. The Shaping and Impact of New Communication Technologies. London: Sage Publications.

One of the classical anthologies on how people buy and sell things, trade them and use them was edited by Arun Appadurai. It's a quarter century old now, and still a classic.

Appadurai, Arjun. 1988. The Social Life of Things: Commodities in Cultural Perspective (Cambridge Studies in Social and Cultural Anthropology). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

To understand the ways that objects become invested with meaning, it is useful to understand the networks that create meaning and the exchanges that imbue objects with meaning. One of the classics in this regard is Marcel Mauss's book on the gift.

Mauss, Marcel. 2000. The Gift: The Form and Reason for Exchange in Archaic Societies. New York: W. W. Norton and Company.

If you take a week or so to read your way through these nine books, they'll give you a broad frame while introducing you to some of the key thinkers who address the issues that concern you. Without arguing that you should adopt the specific perspectives of any one author, you'll get a chance to see how people think about artifacts from the perspectives of several disciplines. The two anthologies (Appadurai 1988, Miller 2005) will also give you a chance to look into reasonably short contributions by a couple dozen excellent writers whose different perspectives, disciplines, and writing styles will shed light on the challenges you face.

If you have time for only one or two books, my personal favorite remains Blomberg because she unfolds the web of action, affiliation, and meaning that coalesced around one specific kind of artifact over several centuries. To get the most useful overview of the field, try Miller's (1998) Material Culture and Miller (2005) Materiality. If you have to decide which books not to read, Mauss, though interesting and important, will be less useful, as will Flichy. 

One technique that I suggest to research students is the value of spending an hour or two with a book that 
sheds light on the topic even when they don't have time to read it completely. Careful work with the introduction, table of contents, first chapter, bibliography, and index open the book to inquiry -- and lets you know whether you ought to go further. This also gives you something to come back to when you find a later gap that the author fills.  

Warm wishes,

Ken

Professor Ken Friedman, PhD, DSc (hc), FDRS | University Distinguished Professor | Dean, Faculty of Design | Swinburne University of Technology | Melbourne, Australia | [log in to unmask] | Ph: +61 3 9214 6078 | Faculty www.swinburne.edu.au/design

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Michael Yap wrote:

--snip--

I was struck by how objects act as containers, holding "great personal 
and collective meaning and carry stories of particular times, places, 
and events."

For thesis, I hope to create conceptual designs that augment common, 
every-day mass-produced objects with short-range RFID, so that they may 
hold the same meaning and stories they always have, but online, and, to 
discover new uses to meet existing needs. I wish to fortify my efforts 
with a better understanding of:

- the social and cultural meaning of every-day objects

- the role that objects play in our every-day lives

- other considerations that I am unaware of but you are compelled to 
share

Can you recommend specific books, articles and other resources to 
advance my understanding?

--snip--