New American Sweatshop

Craft & Design Technology
New American Sweatshop
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Artist and inventor Amelia Marzec has created an ingenious community project, called “New American Sweatshop,” in which she is attempting to reduce our dependence on electronics produced in sweatshops by salvaging components from broken electronics to be used in new domestic electronics projects.

The New American Sweatshop is an immersive experience where participants re-purpose electronic waste to create communication devices for the future. Using local resources and temporary spaces, it engages the community in defining what manufacturing could look like in a post-industrial economy.

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2 thoughts on “New American Sweatshop

  1. chuck says:

    It would be awesome if every consumer device was created around an easily reprogrammable micro controller/computer ala Arduino, RasPi, etc. Yesterday’s mp3 player could be reconfigured to be tomorrow’s lighting controller. This would eliminate a lot of e waste as obsolete devices would still have value to a home grown remanufacturing industry. Unfortunately, waste is a necessary component of modern economics and less waste = less profits.
    We can at least dream of a sane world can’t we?

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Artist, writer, and teacher who makes work about popular culture, technology, and traditional craft processes. http://www.andrewsalomone.com

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