ABOUT THIS BOOK

Fashionable Masculinities explores the expression of masculinities through constructions of fashion, identity, style and appearance as the third decade of the new millennium begins: a contradictory and precarious moment when masculinities are defined by protests and pandemics whilst being problematized across class, ethnicity, race, gender and sexuality. Whilst a majority of men might still define themselves as ‘traditional,’ post-millennials are now talking about how they envision a future without gender boundaries and borders. Rather than being defined as a gender, masculinity has now become a style that can be worn and performed as traditional and normative codes of masculinity are modulated and manipulated. This volume includes original essays on musical pop sensation Harry Styles, rapper and producer “Puff Daddy” Sean Combs, lumbersexuals, spornosexuals, sexy daddies, and aging cool black daddies. Bringing together contributions from leading scholars, this book interrogates and challenges the meaning of masculinities and the ways that they are experienced and lived.

AUTHOR BIOGRAPHY

VICKI KARAMINAS is Professor of Fashion at Massey University New Zealand and Honorary Research Fellow at the Centre of Visual Arts, the University of Melbourne, Australia. She edits and sits on a number of editorial and advisory boards and is the Chair of Trustees for the Association of Dress Historians and the founding President of the Popular Culture Association of Australia and New Zealand.

ADAM GECZY is an artist and writer who teaches at the University of Sydney. His exhibitions across Australia and Europe have received considerable critical acclaim and his work appears in numerous national collections. With some twenty books, in 2009 he won the Choice award for best academic title in art.

PAMELA CHURCH GIBSON is Reader in Film & Cultural Studies at the London College of Fashion and has published extensively on film, fashion, and heritage. She is the founder and Principal Editor of the journal Film, Fashion & Consumption, and Principal Editor of the book series, Films and Fashions at Edinburgh University Press. Her articles on film and on fashion can be found in various peer-reviewed journals, and her books include: The Oxford Guide to Film Studies, with John Hill, Fashion Cultures, with Stella Bruzzi, and Fashion and Celebrity Culture.

REVIEWS

"Contributors include some of the best minds in their field ... and the book’s 16 chapters are accessible to anyone interested in gender and clothing. ...Fashionable Masculinities picks apart our understanding of manhood, showing how 'masculinity has become a style that can be worn, assumed — or abjured.'"

— Derek Guy, Vulture.com & New York Magazine

"This text represents the future of men’s fashion studies. It symbolizes a pivotal turn for understanding this discipline. The contributors take us on a journey through men’s fashion from the beginning into contemporary style. This book is crucial for anyone interested in men’s appearances, fashion, and lifestyles."

— Joseph H. Hancock, II, professor, Drexel University, Philadelphia

"It is not just queers, pimp daddies, and lumbersexuals who rendezvous on this volume; it is a whole spectrum of masculinities: blak-indigenous men, gym bros, ageing action heroes, retro hipsters, Harry, and gen-Z influencers. Masculinities are legion: fluid, complex, and poised to forever resist essentializing binaries and gender signifiers. This timely volume, written by top experts in the field, offers a thorough insight into the design, advertising, retail, and consumption of fashionable masculinities."

— José Blanco F., Chair of Fashion, Dominican University, Illinois

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Foreword
Christopher Breward
Introduction
Vicki Karaminas, Adam Geczy, and Pamela Church Gibson
1 Harry Styles: Fashion’s Gender Changeling
Vicki Karaminas and Justine Taylor
2 Puff Daddy’s Mogul Style: Penis in Furs or Surface Tensions?
Nigel Lezama
3 Daddy Cool: Aging Black Male Bodies and Embodied Stylin’
Michael McMillan
4 Unisex and Individuation: Contemporary Russian Fashion and Men’s (Self)-Styling
Vlad Strukov
5 Spectacularizing the Male Body: Fashionable Physiques in the Age of Instagram
Jay McCauley Bowstead
6 One Sexy Daddy: Desirable Dad “Bods” and the Popular Romance Novel
Jonathan A. Allan
7 The Bodyclad Cinematic Hero: Aging, Masculinity, and Technological Mediation
Adam Geczy
8 The Rise of the Bottom: Counterdiscourse to Challenge Heteronormativity within the Gay Community
Andrew Reilly
9 Unfashionable Goodes: The Wrong Kind of Blak and the Scandalization of Indigenous Masculinities in Settler-Australia
Barry Judd and Nikita Vanderbyl
10 The Rough and the Smooth Revisited: Masculinity, Fashion, and James Bond for a New Millennium
Pamela Church Gibson
11 “Coming Out” and Fitting In: The Role of Dress and Style in Fashioning Gay Men’s Identities in the New Millennium
Shaun Cole
12 Crip Masculinities and Everyday Dress: Intersectional Narratives of Imagination, Access, and Ownership
Ben Barry
13 Dandyism Revisited: From the English Gent to the Sapeur
Olga Vainshtein
14 Beard-Grooming Brands and Products as Representations of Masculinity
Victor Vey
15 Gent-rifying the Stylish Neighborhood: An Examination of Retail Accommodation for the Asian Urban Male Consumer
Anne Peirson-Smith and Jennifer Craik
16 A Vision of a Modern Dandy
Julio Mompó with Olga Vainshtein
Acknowledgments
Bibliography
Notes on Contributors
Index