Berg Encyclopedia of World Dress and Fashion Vol 1: Africa

(Hardback)

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Description

Lavishly illustrated with over 300 images - most previously unpublished - Africa is the first major reference work to offer a comprehensive overview of dress and adornment in this vast continent of many nations and peoples. This volume examines past and present dress practices, including the ornamental and symbolic meaning of body decoration, the historical significance of cloth and textiles, and the ancient trading relationships and migrations that have shaped Africa's complex material culture. This is a land of contrasts, where age-old ceremonial dress and mask traditions coexist with the trappings of a modern, globalized society. The rich, varied, and often deeply symbolic dress of African peoples is given its fullest coverage to date in this landmark work.

Reviews

It is hard to avoid the use of superlatives in reviewing this ambitious, erudite and authoritative series. Taking dress, fashion and (implicitly) the textiles and other materials that have adorned cross-cultural bodies throughout history as its themes, this ten-volume publication (with 6000 pages and 200 images) provides an extraordinary and rigorous contribution, not only to these, but a breadth of related disciplines. * Textile Journal Review of the Berg Encyclopedia of World Dress and Fashion: Ten volume set *
This work is arguably the new benchmark in its field ... the set is magnificent ... Essential for larger public libraries and academic institutions; appropriate for students of cultural, social, artistic, and anthropological studies. [starred status] * Library Journal Review of the Berg Encyclopedia of World Dress and Fashion: Ten volume set *

Author Bio

Joanne B. Eicher is Regents Professor Emerita at the University of Minnesota and Director of the Goldstein Museum of Design. She is Editor for Berg's Dress, Body, Culture series, and is the author, co-author or editor of a wide range of books including: The Visible Self; Mother, Sister, Bride: Rituals of Womanhood; Fashion Foundations; and Dress and Ethnicity. Doran H. Ross was a past president of the Arts Council of the African Studies Association, and, until his death in 2020, a consulting editor of the journal, African Arts.