Look up Bricolage in
Wiktionary, the free dictionary.

For the Amon Tobin album with this name, see Bricolage (album).

Bricolage is a term used in several disciplines, among them the visual arts and literature, to refer to: Wikipedia does not have an article with this exact name. ... Wiktionary (a portmanteau of wiki and dictionary) is a multilingual, Web-based project to create a free content dictionary, available in over 150 languages. ... Amon Tobin performing live. ... Bricolage Album by Amon Tobin Professional reviews Pitchfork Media 10. ... The Mona Lisa is one of the most recognizable artistic paintings in the Western world. ... Old book bindings at the Merton College library. ...

• the construction or creation of a work from a diverse range of things which happen to be available;
• a work created by such a process.

It is borrowed from the French word bricolage, from the verb bricoler – equivalent to the English "do-it-yourself", the core meaning in French being, however, "fiddle, tinker" and, by extension, "make creative and resourceful use of whatever materials are to hand (regardless of their original purpose)".

Bricolage as a design approach – in the sense of building by trial and error – is often contrasted to engineering: theory-based construction. All Saints Chapel in the Cathedral Basilica of St. ...

A person who engages in bricolage is a bricoleur: someone who invents his or her own strategies for using existing materials in a creative, resourceful, and original way.

Culture

Anthropology

In his book The Savage Mind' (1962, English translation 1966), French anthropologist Claude Lévi-Strauss used the word bricolage to describe the characteristic patterns of mythological thought. ^[1] Claude Lévi-Strauss Claude Lévi-Strauss (IPA pronunciation ); born November 28, 1908) is a Jewish-French anthropologist who developed structuralism as a method of understanding human society and culture. ...

Jacques Derrida extends this notion to any discourse. "If one calls bricolage the necessity of borrowing one's concept from the text of a heritage which is more or less coherent or ruined, it must be said that every discourse is bricoleur." ^[2] Jacques Derrida (July 15, 1930 – October 8, 2004) was an Algerian-born French philosopher, known as the founder of deconstruction. ...

Cultural studies

In cultural studies bricolage is used to mean the processes by which people acquire objects from across social divisions to create new cultural identities. In particular, it is a feature of subcultures such as, for example, the punk movement. Here, objects that possess one meaning (or no meaning) in the dominant culture are acquired and given a new, often subversive meaning. For example, the safety pin became a form of decoration in punk culture. This article needs additional references or sources for verification. ... In sociology, anthropology and cultural studies, a subculture is a set of people with a set of behaviors and beliefs, culture, which could be distinct or hidden, that differentiate them from the larger culture to which they belong. ... This article needs additional references or sources for verification. ... A safety pin. ...

Children's Geographies

Hugh Matthews and Faith Tucker (2006) discuss the bricolage of rural teenaged girls. Their research is based in rural south Northamptonshire and portrays the ways in which young people carve out their own environments from otherwise adult-defined spaces.

Visual Art

In art, bricolage is a technique where works are constructed from various materials available or on hand, and is seen as a characteristic of postmodern works. Postmodernity (also called post-modernity or the postmodern condition) is a term used by philosophers, social scientists, art critics and social critics to refer to aspects of contemporary art, culture, economics and social conditions that are the result of the unique features of late 20th century and early 21st century...

These materials may be mass-produced or "junk". See also: Merz, polystylism, collage. Mass production is the production of large amounts of standardised products on production lines. ... Kurt Schwitters (June 20, 1887 - January 8, 1948) was a German painter who was born in Hanover, Germany. ... Polystylism is the use of multiple styles or techniques of music, and is seen as a postmodern characteristic. ... A collage composed of magazine articles and pictures Collage (From the French: , to stick) is regarded as a work of visual arts made from an assemblage of different forms, thus creating a new whole. ...

Music

Instrumental Bricolage in music would include the use of found objects as instruments:

• Irish Spoons
• Australian slap bass made from a tea chest
• comb and wax paper for humming through
• gumleaf humming
• Largophone (made from a stick and bottle tops)
• Trindanian Steel drums (made from industrial storage drums)
• African drums and thumb pianos made from recycled pots and pans.

Stylistic Bricolage is the inclusion of common musical devices with new uses. Shuker [1998 Popular Music: Key Concepts ] writes "Punk best emphasized such stylistic bricolage". Two of the dominant concepts of the Punk movement: DIY (do it yourself) and anti-establishmentarism, fuel the Bricolage style. Operatic Rock is another example: it is a new use of Opera mixed with old fashioned Rock. Occasionally Bricolage appears in Pop music with the use of unusual cultural influences such as folkloric objects such as Irish spoons, Spanish modes, Slavic rhythms, Indian singing-style or Arabic chants for example.

Musical Bricolage flourishes in music of sub-cultures where:

• experimentation is part of daily life (pioneers, immigrants, artistic communities),
• access to resources is limited (such as in remote, discriminated or financially disconnected sub-cultures) which limits commercial influence (eg. acoustic performers, gypsies, ghetto music, hippie, folk or traditional musicians) and
• there is a political or social drive to seek individuality (eg. Rap music, peace-drives, drummers circles)

Unlike other bricolage fields

• intimate knowledge of resources is not necessary (many Punk musicians are not classically trained. Classical training discourages creativity in preference for accuracy).
• careful observation and listening is not necessary, it is common in spontaneous music to welcome 'errors' and disharmony.

Like other bricolage fields, Bricolage music still values

• trusting one's ideas
• self-correcting structures (targeted audiences, even if limited)

Bricolage is the name of a 1997 album by the Electronic Jazz Breakbeat artist Amon Tobin.
"bRiCoLAge #1" is a Girl Talk album released in 2003.
Bricolage is the name of a Glaswegian band made up of Wallace Meek (guitar, bass, vocals), Graham Wann (guitar, vocals), Darren Cameron (bass, keyboards, vocals) and Colin Kearney (drums). "the.bricoleur" is the name of a musical project started in 2005 by Michael Lawrence (the.bricoleur). Bricolage Album by Amon Tobin Professional reviews Pitchfork Media 10. ... Amon Tobin performing live. ... Girl Talk is the stage name of electronic music producer Gregg Gillis. ... For other uses, see Glasgow (disambiguation) George Square and Glasgows City Chambers Glasgow is Scotlands largest city, located on the River Clyde in West Central Scotland. ...

Television

MacGyver is a television series in which the protagonist is the paragon of a bricoleur. This article does not cite any references or sources. ...

Science

Biology

In biology the biologist François Jacob uses the term bricolage to describe the apparently cobbled-together character of much biological structure, and views it as a consequence of the evolutionary history of the organism. ^[3] This article needs additional references or sources for verification. ... A biologist is a scientist devoted to and producing results in biology through the study of organisms. ... François Jacob (June 17, 1920 Nancy, France -- ) is a French biologist, who together with Jacques Monod, originated the idea that control of enzyme levels in all cells happens through feedback on transcription. ... This article is about evolution in biology. ...

Education

In the discussion of constructionism Seymour Papert discusses two styles of solving problems. Contrary to the analytical style of solving problems he describes bricolage as a way to learn and solve problems by trying, testing, playing around. Constructionism may refer to Social constructionism Strict constructionism - a term referring to a conservative type of legal or constitutional interpretation. ... Seymour Papert Seymour Papert (born March 1, 1928 Pretoria, South Africa) is an MIT mathematician, computer scientist, and prominent educator. ...

Computer Games

In the computer game Marathon, the self-aware AI says "Freedom is being the bricolur(sic), the Mason" in a reference to his quest to become God and be free.

Information technology

Information systems

In information systems, bricolage is used by Claudio Ciborra (1992) ^[4] to describe the way in which Strategic Information Systems (SIS) can be built in order to maintain successful competitive advantage over a longer period of time than standard SIS. By valuing tinkering and allowing SIS to evolve from the bottom-up, rather than implementing it from the top-down, the firm will end up with something that is deeply rooted in the organisational culture that is specific to that firm and is much less easily imitated. Information System (example) Information System (IS) is the system of persons, data records and activities that process the data and information in a given organization, including manual processes or automated processes. ... Professor Claudio Ciborra died in Milan on 13 February 2005 Professor of Information Systems and PwC Chair in Risk Management Department of Information Systems London School of Economics and Political Science (LSE) Main research interests Claudio was an original thinker in his field (The Social Study of Information Systems). ... In marketing and strategic management, sustainable competitive advantage is an advantage that one firm has relative to competing firms. ... Organizational culture comprises the attitudes, values, beliefs, norms and customs of an organization. ...

There is also a content management system called Bricolage. See http://bricolage.cc. In the FAQ regarding its name it references the concept of Claude Lévi-Strauss. A Content Management System (CMS) is a software system used for content management. ...

Internet

In her book Life on the Screen (1995), Sherry Turkle discusses the concept of bricolage as it applies to problem solving in code projects and workspace productivity. She advocates the "bricoleur style" of programming as a valid and underexamined alternative to what she describes as the conventional structured "planner" approach. In this style of coding, the programmer works without an exhaustive preliminary specification, opting instead for a step-by-step growth and re-evaluation process. In her essay Epistemological Pluralism, Turkle writes: "The bricoleur resembles the painter who stands back between brushstrokes, looks at the canvas, and only after this contemplation, decides what to do next." Life on the Screen: Identity in the Age of the Internet is a study of how people interact with machines and some of the consequences for the way people use these computers by clinical psychologist and professor Sherry Turkle. ... Sherry Turkle (born 1948) is a clinical psychologist and a professor of Science, Technology and Society at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. ...

Organization and Management

Karl Weick identifies the following requirements for successful bricolage in organizations.^[5] Karl Weick is a noted organizational theorist who is famous for his loose coupling and sense-making theories in organizations. ...

• intimate knowledge of resources
• careful observation and listening
• trusting one's ideas
• self-correcting structures, with feedback

References

1. ^ Claude Lévi-Strauss, La Pensée sauvage (Paris, 1962). English translation as The Savage Mind (Chicago, 1966). ISBN 0-226-47484-4. See also [1] [2]
2. ^ Jacques Derrida, "Structure, Sign, and Play in the Discourse of the Human Sciences"
3. ^ Molino, Jean (2000). "Toward an Evolutionary Theory of Music and Language", The Origins of Music. Cambridge, Mass: A Bradford Book, The MIT Press. ISBN 0-262-23206-5. (p.169). See also "Bicoid, nanos, and bricolage" by PZ Myers.
4. ^ Ciborra, C (1992). "From Thinking to Tinkering: The Grassroots of Strategic Information Systems", The Information Society 8, 297-309
5. ^ Karl Weick, "Organizational Redesign as Improvisation", reprinted in Making Sense of the Organization

6. Matthews, H. & Tucker, F. (2006) On the Other side of the tracks: the psychogeographies and everyday lives of rural teenagers in the UK. In: Spencer, C. & Blades, M. (eds) Children and their Environments: Learning, Using and Designing Spaces. Cambridge, Cambridge University Press. p. 161-175. Jacques Derrida (July 15, 1930 – October 8, 2004) was an Algerian-born French philosopher, known as the founder of deconstruction. ... Paul Zachary PZ Myers (born March 9, 1957) is an American biology professor at the University of Minnesota, Morris and a science blogger via his blog, Pharyngula (previously ). He is currently an associate professor of biology at Morris, works in the field of evolutionary developmental biology (evo-devo), and has...