About
Χαίρετε
This website is a work of love. It is dedicated to the women and men of Greece who took the time to teach me how to spin and weave so many years ago.
The weaving processes and weavings displayed come from many parts of Greece including: Arcadia, Argolidos, Crete, Epirus, Macedonia, and Thessaly.
Dr. Joan Bouza Koster
Periods of ethnographic research in Greece represented on this site cover the years 1971 to 1991.
During that period, weavers were interviewed, time motion studies were done, weavings and weaving tools were collected, and fiber processing facilities were visited
Publications by the author include:
Publications by the author include:
2000 “Nobody weaves here anymore: Technological change and the persistence of weaving in the Southern Argolid.” In S. Sutton (Ed.), The Contingent Landscape Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press.
1996 “The waning of the moon: Fiber processing in rural Crete.” Shuttle, Spindle & Dyepot, 27(2), 43-47.
1985 “Contemporary Sarakatsani weaving in the Northern Peloponnese.” In Female Costume of the Sarakatsani. Haffrenreffer Museum of Anthropology: Paper Number 1, (pp. 28-36), Providence, RI: Brown University.
1981 “The Tagari: A Greek saddlebag.” Weaver’s Journal, 8(3), 10-13.
1979 Handloom Construction: A Practical Guide for the Non-Expert. Mt. Rainier; MD: VITA
1979 “The Carding Box.” Shuttle, Spindle and Dyepot, 10(4), 15.
1978 Kuper, J. (Ed.), The Anthropologist’s Cookbook. London: Routledge, Kegan and Kegan Paul, Ltd
1978 “Arachne’s Children.” Shuttle, Spindle and Dyepot, 9(3), 16-18.
1978 “From the flocks of Greece: Galopita.” In J. Kuper (Ed.), The Anthropologists’ Cookbook. (pp. 27-30). London: Routledge, Kegan and Kegan Paul, Ltd.
1976 “From spindle to loom: Weaving in the Southern Argolid, Greece.” Expedition, 19(1), 29-39.
1976 “Competition or symbiosis?” Pastoral Adaptive Strategies in the Southern Argolid, Greece.” (with Harold Koster). In E. Friedl & M. Dimen. (Eds.) Regional Variation in Modern Greece and Cyprus, Volume 268 (pp. 275-285). New York: Annuals of the New York Academy of Sciences.
1975 “All in the Family: Decision making in an Intensifying Family Economy.” Paper presented at the74th Annual meeting of the American Anthropological Association, San Francisco, CA.
Full-text versions of many of the above are available on Research Gate.
More about the author:
Dr. Joan Bouza Koster is an award-winning author of fiction and nonfiction works in the fields of ethnography, education, anti-racism, and the arts. She holds a doctorate from Binghamton University and has published two textbooks on teaching the arts to young children: Growing Artists and Bringing Art into the Elementary Classroom. For many years, she raised sheep and ran a successful handweaving craft business, The Smiling Shepherd.
Her dissertation on Addressing Racism through Children’s Literature was named the most distinguished dissertation in 2005. Her short stories have appeared in several anthologies, and have received awards from Women on Writing, Stone Thread Publishing, Tryst Literary Magazine, and Winning Writers. Her first historical fiction novel longlisted for the Mslexia Award. Under the pen name, Zara West, she has published the award-winning romantic thriller series, The Skin Quartet. She is currently in the process of writing a historical fiction series about nineteenth-century women who never should have been forgotten.
She is also the author of the top-selling Write for Success series: Fast Draft Your Manuscript and Get It Done Now, Revise Your Draft and Make It Shine, Research Your Subject and Validate Your Writing, and Power Charge Your Language and Make It Sing, published by Short FUSE.
Dr. Joan Bouza Koster blogs at JoanKoster.com, Women Words and Wisdom, American Civil War Voice, TeachPeaceNow.com, and Zara West’s Journal and has taught numerous fiber arts workshops and online writing courses. Find her current teaching schedule here, and sign up for her mailing list here.
A complete listing of her books can be found here.
