FOR MUCH OF HISTORY, CRAFT HAS BEEN AN IMPORtant function in human culture. The time-honored practice of any craft (like that of garment makers, weavers, stone carvers, or cabinetmakers) involves the fashioning of materials into an end product through the exercise of skills that can be learned and perfected. They draw, measure, cut, assemble, glue, nail, stitch, polish, trim. To anyone unskilled in a craft, the results seem almost magical; but its practitioners have