Republics of Letters publishes occasional dispatches from the front lines of scholar-
ship, where new methods are explored and projects undergo rethinking. In the follow-
ing essay, Ariel Stilerman (Assistant Professor of East Asian Languages and Cultures,
Stanford University) discusses what he learned moving between the Stanford
Humanities Center (2023–24 Fellow) and the Product Realization Lab, where he
experimented with fabricating facsimiles of objects of medieval Japan such as illus-
trated scrolls and woodworking saws, as part of an exploration of “critical making.”