“A powerful and timely contribution to U.S. literary studies and working-class studies. . . . Stylishly written, impeccably researched, and carefully argued, it presents a deft, textured analysis of the meanings of cloth and clothing in the writings of a diverse array of Anglo-American and African American authors.”
—Lori Merish, Georgetown University
— Lori Merish, Georgetown University
“Returns boldly to decade-long conversations about the literariness of African American writing. Cook includes a vast array of texts, from early slave narratives and novels to end-of-the-century writings by Washington, Chesnutt, and Du Bois to WPA interviews with former slaves.”
—Susan S. Williams, The Ohio State University
— Susan S. Williams, The Ohio State University
Featured in the Journal of Blacks in Higher Education as a "Recent Book of Interest for African American Scholars"
— Sylvia Jenkins Cook, The Journal of Blacks in Higher Education
"The academic value and social currency of Cook’s research lies very much in her subsuming of personal stories and narrated retellings into a wider reading of the cotton industry and the American economy, contributing along the way a much-needed survey of the various mechanisms that have long perpetuated disenfranchisement and marginalization under the auspices of the desires of the everyday consumer."
—Fashion Theory
— Kevin Alexander Su, Fashion Theory
"Cook’s analysis of these works provides an apt capstone to her impressive contribution to material culture scholarship. Essential."
—CHOICE
— G. E. Bender, CHOICE
Awarded Honorable Mention for the 2020 Modern Language Association William Sanders Scarborough Prize (MLA)
— Modern Language Association William Sanders Scarborough Prize (MLA)
"Cook provides a new way of thinking about the writings of working people who were involved in the empire of cotton, drawing a line from Mississippi cotton fields to the New England textile mills, to the modiste studios of New York and Washington, D.C."
—American Literary History
— Sarah E. Chinn, American Literary History
"Cook’s analysis of these works provides an apt capstone to her impressive contribution to material culture scholarship. Essential."
—CHOICE
— G. E. Bender, CHOICE
"The academic value and social currency of Cook’s research lies very much in her subsuming of personal stories and narrated retellings into a wider reading of the cotton industry and the American economy, contributing along the way a much-needed survey of the various mechanisms that have long perpetuated disenfranchisement and marginalization under the auspices of the desires of the everyday consumer."
—Fashion Theory
— Kevin Alexander Su, Fashion Theory
“A powerful and timely contribution to U.S. literary studies and working-class studies. . . . Stylishly written, impeccably researched, and carefully argued, it presents a deft, textured analysis of the meanings of cloth and clothing in the writings of a diverse array of Anglo-American and African American authors.”
—Lori Merish, Georgetown University
— Lori Merish, Georgetown University
Honorable Mention: Modern Language Association (MLA) 2020 William Sanders Scarborough Prize
— MLA William Sanders Scarborough Prize
“Returns boldly to decade-long conversations about the literariness of African American writing. Cook includes a vast array of texts, from early slave narratives and novels to end-of-the-century writings by Washington, Chesnutt, and Du Bois to WPA interviews with former slaves.”
—Susan S. Williams, The Ohio State University
— Susan S. Williams, The Ohio State University
Featured in the Journal of Blacks in Higher Education as a "Recent Book of Interest for African American Scholars"
— Sylvia Jenkins Cook, The Journal of Blacks in Higher Education