Caribbean Women, Creole Fashioning, and the Fabric of Black Atlantic Writing
Abstract On October 1,1768, Jamaican overseer and plantation owner Thomas Thistle wood recorded the following incident between two enslaved seamstresses: he writes, “Phibbah’s Coobah marked on Silvia’s smock bosom. D Τ S J H, for Dago, her husband; Mr. Meyler’s Tom, her sweetheart; and John Hart[nol]e, who she is supposed to love best; and other […]
Black Hair/Style Politics
new formations NUMBER 3 WINTER 1987 Kobena Mercer BLACK HAIR/STYLE POLITICS Some time ago Michael Jackson’s hair caught fire when he was filming a television commercial. Perhaps the incident became newsworthy because it brought together two seemingly opposed news-values: fame and misfortune. But judging by the way it was reported in one black community newspaper, […]
Female MC’s and the Battle for Style Supremacy
By Ericka Basile In the late 1970s and 80s, during hip hop’s humble beginnings, female rappers developed carefully costumed persona’s found in concert flyers, album covers, and vividly articulated rap lyrics-unforgettable looks that helped define the rap genre- now itself a worldwide cultural force, originally created by youth of the African Diaspora in New York City. On […]
Reflections of Durbar in the Diaspora
Teleica Kirkland Abstract This article questions if the propensity of black men in globally dominant western countries to wear black or dark colours is an outcome of internalised subjugation and an adherence to westernised projections of masculinity. It uses the 2018 Akinola Davies Junior film Zazzau as its backdrop, drawing parallels with other examples of […]