Abstract: leaves [i-iii]

Catalog of an exhibition held at Balai Seni Lukis Negara, Malaysia.

This book constitutes the first comprehensive history of the network of women who worked at the heart of the English Arts and Crafts movement from the 1870s to the 1930s. Challenging the long-standing assumption that the Arts and Crafts simply revolved around celebrated male designers like William Morris, it instead offers a new social and cultural account of the movement, which simultaneously reveals the breadth of the imprint of women art workers upon the making of modern society. Thomas provides unprecedented insight into how women navigated authoritative roles as 'art workers' by asserting expertise across a range of interconnected cultures: from the artistic to the professional, intellectual, entrepreneurial and domestic. Through examination of newly discovered institutional archives and private papers, Thomas elucidates the critical importance of the spaces around which women conceptualised alternative creative and professional lifestyles.

In many parts of South-East Asia, women's lifestyles are going through enormous changes as women move from traditional rural, agricultural lifestyles to modern, urban lifestyles, which often involve migration to cities, taking on paid work, and having a quite different relationship with their families. This book, based on intensive research among the women of the Bidayuh people in Sarawak, all of them first generation migrant wage workers, explores the extent to which women's lifestyles are changing, and the reasons which prompt women to make the changes. How far are such women driven by economic considerations, how far by dissatisfaction with traditional lifestyles, and how far by the appeal of a glamorous urban lifestyle? The author's research includes detailed interviews in the field, and much of this interview material is included in the book, thereby enabling the Bidayuh women to tell their own stories as they grapple with the rapid changes swirling around them.

With text and detailed color pictures, describes the social, cultural, and economic history of Malaysia.