Fashion has always been strongly linked with the politics of gender and equality. In this global and interdisciplinary collection, leading authors explore the relationships between the dressed body, fashion, sex, and power, with an emphasis on the role of dress in both reinforcing and challenging social norms.
Covering a range of geographic and social contexts, the book explores the role of fashion in empowering both individuals and groups to create transformation and change. Taking us from the performance of black dandyism through stylized hats, to the use of challenging dance forms and male-inspired dress by female South African dancers to express independence and equality, to ways in which recent Bond Girls have challenged traditional gender binaries, the book provides a crucial entry point into discussions of fashion as an empowerment strategy.
Fashion, Agency, and Empowerment encourages the reader to critically examine the cultural and social impact of sexual objectification, as well as to consider personal and shared narratives of self-objectification and repression. With chapters ranging from the iconic self-fashioning of Princess Diana to a discussion of sex, power, and cultural constructions of masculinity, Fashion, Agency, and Empowerment provides crucial insights into global fashion, political structures, and social life.
List of Illustrations
Notes on Contributors
Introduction
Fashion, Agency and Empowerment
Annette Lynch and Katalin Medvedev
Fashion as Challenge and Empowerment
Chapter 1
The Beauty Divide: Black Millennial Women Seek Agency with Makeup Art Cosmetics (MAC)
Jaleesa Reed and Katalin Medvedev
Chapter 2
Kangol Kool: Stylized Hats and the Performance of Black Dandyism
Derrick Williams
Chapter 3
Challenging the Gender Binary in Bond Films: Bond Girls, Female Villains, and James
Laureen Gibson
Chapter 4
Menswear in the Millennium: Bending the Gender Binary
Parker Bennett
Dialogues between Dress and Structures of Power
Chapter 5
High Flying Fashions: Ghana Airways' Female Flight Attendants as Exemplars of the Nation
Christopher Richards
Chapter 6
First Ladies of the Raj: Status and Empowerment in British India
Donald Clay Johnson
Chapter 7
The Lady was a Mshoza: Female Agency and Empowerment in South African Pantsula Dance and Culture
Daniela Goeller
Chapter 8
Penetrating Knits: Feminists Knit 'Cunty First' and 'The Pussyhat'
Rebecca E. Schuiling and Theresa Winge
Chapter 9
The Choli and the Empowerment of Indian Women
Vandana Bhandari
Narratives of Objectification and Self-Objectification
Chapter 10
The Prowess of a Virgin Goddess and a Seductress: Analyzing the Ideals of Female Sexuality of Princess Diana and Kate Middleton
Caroline McCauley
Chapter 11
Dress and Sex Work - Attracting Customers through Virtual Environments
Tasoulla Hadiyanni and Kim K. Johnson
Chapter 12
Stripping of Power: Dress and Undress of Afro-Brazilian Women in the Scientific Work of Louis and Elizabeth Agassiz
Kelly Mohs Gage
Chapter 13
Turning Self to Object: Costume, Identity, and Gender Roles in Alice Austen's Photographic Self-Portraits
Keren Ben-Horin
Bibliography
Index
