What does scrapbooking tell us about the human race?

Answer 1

It is doomed to end.

Answer 2

"Man is
the symbol-using (symbol-making, symbol-misusing) animal
inventor of the negative (or moralized by the negative)
separated from his natural condition by instruments of his own making
goaded by the spirit of hierarchy (or moved by the sense of order)
and rotten with perfection"

-- Kenneth Burke ("Definition of Man" in Language as Symbolic Action)

When I read this question, I immediately thought of scrapbooking in terms of a (re)representing of ourselves, or a part of ourselves, via symbols--arranging a set of experiences and motifs, employing little representations. That's why the above quote came to mind, to answer the implicit question: What are we *really* doing when we're scrapbooking?

As a race, we love a good theme to our lives. A scrapbook is a distillation of one, or part of one, life into a simply understood order of events that paints the life simply and directly. For an analogy, consider theme parks, which seem to be a large interactive scrapbook intended to represent a culture(s) of people, inscribed with predesigned experiences and memories meant to resonate with--and, in doing so, include--those belonging to the given culture. Well, scale back down, and you could say that the scrapbook presents one's life such that those perusing it vicariously share the "predesigned experience" with the subject. In doing so, we create an order or "hierarchy" reified, or made more "true," as it is perused, shared, and accepted by others.

So, maybe scrapbooking just helps tell us that the human race is obsessed(?) with (re)representing itself over and over.

Answer 3

Some people have worse memories than others so they need physical objects to help recall those things that they forgot.

Also, that some people are eccentric and have waayyyy too much time on their hands.

Answer 4

It tells me people like to add a human touch. I think it is lovely!

Answer 5

History must exist to learn from it or just to laugh a lot and think what a waste of time it all was.

Answer 6

That we're afraid of forgetting because we're afraid to be forgotten.

And that maybe enough sparkles, glue, confetti and construction paper can help us forget the real reason we're doing it.

Answer 7

We like to record our precious memories in case our memory starts to fail.

Answer 8

that happy memorys are so rare that we must take the few that we gather and embelish them further to be hopefull. or that we are so bored that we make a hobby out of making our memories redundent.

Answer 9

We like to collect all kinds of stuff and cram them in a book with plenty of glue?

;)

Mike

Answer 10

we love to dwell on happy memories from the past

Answer 11

That making our memories accessible, pretty is appealing and that we are creative.