phys.org/news/2018-08-i… <-- fascinating article on the discovery that the Inuit were spinning yarn about 1000 years before Viking contact, up-ending the current idea that the Vikings introduced spinning to the Inuit. Two favorite things from this article:
(1) In Norse culture textiles were a very gendered thing: only women made yarn and turned yarn into cloth. And YET...cloth was so immensely valuable that it was literally CURRENCY for 800 YEARS. Now think about how often people degrade spinning, knitting, sewing as silly hobbies.
(2) The notion that the Inuit couldn't have *possibly* known how to spin yarn themselves, and that only Nordic white people could have brought that skill to them. NEWP! The author says that he's not sure why "the idea of indigenous fiber technology [is] shocking".
