Socks and the politics of knitting

All of my knitting projects are moving along slowly. The Special General Meeting of the Knitters Guild of NSW yesterday was a good opportunity to work on socks, and I've now got quite a good way into my Blue Coffee socks (remember the Blue Chocolate ones?) The yarn is Cherry Tree Hill Sockittome, colour Java. Isn't it lovely? And the tight twist makes it perfect for one of the gansey patterns from Wendy Johnson's new book on toeup socks. Wendy's free generic toeup sock pattern is the only one I've ever used, with the modification of the Sherman Heel and toe, and although Wendy uses two circs and has added a few choices for the heels and toes, I've simply put the gansey texture into my old favourite pattern. I love this book of Wendy's; it has many patterns for socks that are interesting without being too tricky to concentrate on - I knit socks when I'm tired and don't want to concentrate on what I'm knitting.  However, Wendy knits her socks so tightly that I've had to modify the patterns, as they'd be too big for my foot at my preferred tension. I simply put a few less stitches in the sole of the sock, so that the pattern comes a little further down the sides of the foot. I like them firm in the foot and looser in the leg, so above the ankle I just follow her pattern.

It's difficult to explain what happened at the SGM, but writing it out here will help me to get my head aroun the issues. The reason for the meeting was to try to regularise the status of over 300 objects that has accumulated at the guild rooms over nearly 30 years, and which is usually referred to as 'the collection' or 'the archives'. They comprise knitted things, crocheted things, a few other hand-made objects, some artefacts such as old needles etc, and some vintage patterns. A few of the original members control access to these objects, which have not been categorised or curated in any way that a museum specialist would consider meaningful. No-one has any idea of their value (although many members who have not seen them are of the opinion that they must be 'priceless'), and they are not stored safely. There were many fears raised at the meeting, such as

• if it is discovered to exist, the whole collection could be suddenly whisked away to The Powerhouse (state museum of social history)
• if it is discovered to exist, it could become the target of thieves (especially if pictures of objects were uploaded to 'the computer')
• the only way to find out exactly what is in it and establish its social significance would be to spend a lot of the Guild's money on 'an expert' (I haven't heard the word 'academic' used as a swear-word by quite such a pleasant-looking women before!)
• this (mythical) need to spend money will have to be met by a tax on members
• if it is discovered to in fact be priceless and needing preserving, it will mean that it can't be handled, and thus can't used for teaching or exhibited by the guild (yes, we'll risk destroying it rather than discover if it might be worthy of preserving)

The voices of reason pointed out that all we were there to do was to pass an amendment to the constitution that would enable the executive to formulate a policy as to how to deal with the collection. They could then put forward a plan to list the purposes that parts of the collection might be put to, such as exhibition, education, preservation, and then maybe apply for a grant to get the objects analysed into the categories agreed to and properly organised, and formulate a future policy for what would be collected and how it would be used and stored. Local councils and the State Government are very keen to help with this kind of project.

In other words, the meeting wasn't really about the collection, but about how we needed to deal consitutionally with the fact that we seem to have one. A legal opinion sought and given by a member of the executive was ignored, the opinions of two people employed in museum work and one historian were ignored, while lots of passion was expended in telling stories about things that have happened since 1988, suspicions were subtly raised that it was really all about people wanting to spend "the members' money" curating the objects, the truly ignorant kept derailing the discussion with completely irrelevant points, and the vote was lost 15 votes to 28.

It was a really fascinating insight into the fear that so many older women have of 'experts', 'government', 'the internet' and many other things that I interact with in my daily life. They are simply not interested in the way that knitting guilds in other countries - or indeed other craft guilds in NSW - operate. They want everything to stay exactly as it has been for many years, or to change only at the pace that they are comfortable with and can control. The saddest thing is that they think they are represent knitting in NSW, whereas of course they are only a tiny minority of knitters, who have taken the time to incorporate and organise.

In time, of course, these issues will be resolved. The guild's constitution doesn't comply with present state law, and a law change later this year which mean a new constitution is needed or the guild will cease to be able to operate. In the course of this process many of the present constitutional lacunae will be closed and the guild will then begin to operate in a much more modern, accountable, transparent fashion. Or, it will die and be replaced with a properly-functioning organisation. The actual outcome is in the hands of the members, and after yesterday I think it is quite likely we will need to found a new guild.

Comments

[Sharre]

You summed the meeting up nicely, I read through the constitution this morning and realised it doesn't even cover the guild's library. *sigh* there are some serious structural issues that need to be dealt with but cannot be until attitudes change. it is sad.

[SallyO]

A very good summary of the day's events. It's all quite sad really, isn't it? If it weren't for the fact that most of my very good knitting friends are members, and I meet great people at groups I go to, I'd give it up. Fortunately, the people there yesterday are I believe in the minority. Unfortunately, they're the most vocal and the most likely to come to meetings.

[missfee]

Gawd it sounds like that the meeting was a concentrated portion of all that is wrong and right about the guild. BLAHGH

Can we just start again?

[diane]

I couldn't make it yesterday as I had to look after my granddaughter (2 1/2 and no good at a meeting) but I am so saddened to hear that it was defeated . If we don't change we will die .

[issy]

Excellent summary of the day.

It was very sad to see that the motion was not passed - as I think that it is of great importance that the guild actually recognise the assets they own!

As I said to one member - even though sentimentally these items are priceless, it is important that they are catalogued and insured so that should anything happen to them the guild would then be provided funds to purchase a replacement (if something similar could be found) or purchase other items to renew the collection or commission replacements (in the case of modern works).

We can only hope that the change in laws will bring with them changes in the constitution that allow all of this to happen.

[Lara]

Agreed - an excellent summary, if lacking any mention of the writhing in pain from those of us that wanted to stick forks in our eyes to distract us from the pain of listening to all that drivel.

As Donna said, "the stupid, it burns".

But of course, you are far to measured and polite for such childishness ;)

It was great to see you both, at least that made up for some of the pain.

[Merrin]

The difficulty with the motion was its wording. I personally don't want to see the Guild tied down to having one of it's Objects to "Develop...an historically significant collection." Most emphatically our current collection does need to be maintained but I don't see our core business being in the area of developing a collection which will need specialist care. I work for an organisation which has an extensive and extremely valuable collection of textiles and I know how much it cost to store, conserve and value such things (btw some of my best friends at work are curators). Develop a reproduction resource collection and sort out the preservation of what we already have (as soon as possible) but leave the development of historically significant collections to the institutions like mine which are set up and paid by the government to do so. Also there are a couple of people I work with who could be willing to do a bit of voluntary collection assessment for us without having to get grants etc, which would ascertain whether anything is actually of historic value and then we can move from there.
One big plus was that it was good to get to meet a few of the "voices" yesterday. Merrin

[Donna]

Today I spent some time looking at the Knitters Guild of America website (www.tkga.com)
Such a professional approach! I know that they are a much bigger organisation, but the NSW Knitters Guild is basically an association of SnB groups, with a few committees. They don't want to change, they seemed quite proud of their amateur status yesterday. Of course, there are exceptions, but my feeling overall is that the majority of the members who were in attendance yesterday want to meet with their friends and knit once a month, with no hard work or thinking involved.
They don't understand change, and they don't want to understand it. And if you told them that people have no interest in the Guild, and that it's going to die out without change, I don't think they'd care, as long as it remains the same throughout their lifetimes.

[SallyO]

I do partly agree with you, Merrin. The problem is that it's taken 20+ years to get where we are, nothing is going to speed these people up, and we're not entirely convinced they know what they're doing. I don't have a lot of faith in someone who describes her progress in terms of the number of words she's written (7,282 for those of you who weren't there). If you've got volunteers who can help with this, wonderful. Bring 'em on (if they're allowed to help!)

[Merrin]

I'm going to have a chat with a couple of bods at work and then Archives Convenor, who thinks I'm wonderful for some reason, so I might be able to get stuff moving without too much angst and motions and perceived threats against the staus quo etc. I'll keep you "posted".

[Jocelyn]

Speaking from thousands of miles away, this is really interesting to read about. There's something about organizations that seems to get hidebound after a while, and sometimes it does take a fresh start to break out of those patterns... Good luck.

[Atholie]

I couldn't attend the SGM -( not a Guild member ;D) - but it seems that nothing changes.

I've been looking at (www.tkga.com) too, Donna. It seems it is possible to have an overseas knitting group (or groups) that are affiliated ....

[Variegated]

I wrote a huge comment that was obviously too big to be accepted, so I stuck it on the blog instead.
A couple of points have occurred to me since:
M-H Why do you feel that the Guild will cease to operate? - the Fair Trading website states that existing Constitutions will be accepted when the changes come in, and that any amendments submitted will have to be complying.
Atholie - I'm already a member of TKGA - let me know if you wish to do anything about an affiliated group