While the U.S. holiday widely known as Thanksgiving (November 25, this year) is not celebrated in France, the timing of this editorial of and by American designer Tom Ford in the current issue of French Vogue is ironic, to say the least. (Readers might recall that French Vogue handed over the December/January issue to Ford.)
We’ve written several posts as well as linked to many more at Native Appropriations, a l’allure garconniere, and Bitch magazine about the cultural and historical violence such acts of casual racism enact. Here’s one more link to Philip J. Deloria’s book Playing Indian. In it, he explains that the cooptation of Native objects and practices are at once “the bedrock for creative American identities, but . . . also one of the foundations (slavery and gender relations being two others) for imagining and performing domination and power in America.” Deloria’s book should be required reading for every American but also everyone in the fashion industry. (This means you too, TopShop.)
threadbared 