Overview

Slaves to Fashion is a cultural history of the black dandy, from his emergence in Enlightenment England to his contemporary incarnations in the cosmopolitan art world. Interpreting performances and representations of black dandyism in particular cultural settings and literary and visual texts, Monica L. Miller emphasizes the importance of sartorial style to black identity formation in the Atlantic diaspora. Dandyism was initially imposed on black men in eighteenth-century England, as the Atlantic slave trade and an emerging culture of conspicuous consumption generated a vogue in dandified black servants. ""Luxury slaves"" tweaked and reworked their uniforms, and were soon known for their sartorial novelty and sometimes flamboyant personalities. Tracing the history of the black dandy to contemporary celebrity incarnations, Miller explains how black people became arbiters of style and how they have historically used the dandy's signature tools to break down limiting identity markers and propose new ways of fashioning political and social possibility. She considers the black dandy in relation to nineteenth-century American literature and drama, Du Bois's reflections on black masculinity and cultural nationalism, the modernist aesthetics of the Harlem Renaissance, and representations of black cosmopolitanism in contemporary art. Contains mature themes.

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Monica L. Miller is a scholar of contemporary African American and Afrodiasporic literature and cultural studies, and is a frequent commentator in the media and arts worlds. She writes and teaches about Black literature, art, and performance; fashion cultures; and, contemporary Black European culture. Janina Edwards, a graduate of New York University's Tisch Schools of the Arts, recorded her first audiobook in 1987. She was born in Chicago, soaked in New York City's African and West Indian accents for 11 years, and for the past twenty years has swum in the swagger of the south (Atlanta, Georgia). As a result, she excels in portraying authentic characters and voices the African Diaspora. Her 2018 audiobook, The Wedding Date, is an AudioFile Earphones Award winner, and Voice of Freedom (2016, Dreamscape) was an Audie Award finalist. In addition to narrating audiobooks, she is a certified yoga teacher, sings kirtan, and plays the violin.

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