Noise along the Network: A Set of Chinese Ming Embroidered Thangkas in the Indian Himalayas

A focus on objects can productively redirect attention away from states and borders toward interlocking zones of contact and to networks within networks. An object transported along the networks inserts the recipient into a wide circulation system, locating it vertically in a hierarchy of importance and horizontally across multiple borders. Objects mediate and motivate such flows, but they can also disrupt and complicate a linear understanding of agency. In the case discussed in this paper, objects haunt the systems of exchange with distorted echoes of long-forgotten agents, agencies, and intentions. The networks linking the Ming 明 Chinese court (1368–1644)