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Commodification, Intellectual Property And The Women Of Gee’S Bend, Victoria F. Phillips

Articles in Law Reviews & Other Academic Journals

In this article the author explores the story of the quilters of Gee’s Bend, Alabama, tracing the emergence of this group of isolated, disenfranchised craftswomen as both fine artists and the unlikely purveyors of mass-market consumer culture through commodification based on the power of intellectual property rights. The author then looks to recent trends in commodification literature to help explore the tensions and dualities presented in the story. Among other things, the article asks whether the quilters have been coerced into the marketplace and are unwittingly alienating part of their identity, or whether they have willingly tapped the power of …