92 | Fem<strong>in</strong>ist <strong>Africa</strong> 21 fists on them” (143), the style also made the women feel more militant, <strong>and</strong> so further susta<strong>in</strong> their resistance. Accord<strong>in</strong>g to Ford, the sexualisation <strong>of</strong> police brutality aga<strong>in</strong>st women <strong>in</strong> black movements also factored <strong>in</strong>to their style choices. Crucially, she notes, too, that the pro-black movements <strong>and</strong> spaces with<strong>in</strong> which the women were located were characterised by patriarchal <strong>politics</strong> <strong>and</strong> notions <strong>of</strong> respectable fem<strong>in</strong><strong>in</strong>ity. Her consideration <strong>of</strong> the activist Olive Morris, <strong>in</strong> London, as a figure who queered soul-style is therefore very important – but is, unfortunately, one <strong>of</strong> only few times that, queerness is considered <strong>in</strong> Liberated Threads. Ford argues that with her gender non-conform<strong>in</strong>g looks, Morris took soulstyle “outside <strong>of</strong> the realms <strong>of</strong> respectable black womanhood” (146) <strong>and</strong> beyond the “radical fem<strong>in</strong><strong>in</strong>e chic” (146), <strong>in</strong>stead <strong>fashion</strong><strong>in</strong>g it <strong>in</strong>to someth<strong>in</strong>g “unique, someth<strong>in</strong>g disturb<strong>in</strong>g” (146). Turn<strong>in</strong>g to <strong>Africa</strong>, the book explores soul-style as it manifests <strong>in</strong> Johannesburg through the early career <strong>of</strong> Miriam Makeba, whose signature looks <strong>in</strong>cluded “<strong>of</strong>f-the-shoulder sheath dresses” (20) below a full, black Afro, a <strong>fashion</strong> which l<strong>in</strong>ked Makeba to the struggle for black liberation long before she spoke on it. Accord<strong>in</strong>g to Ford, Makeba appealed to her grow<strong>in</strong>g <strong>in</strong>ternational audiences as a k<strong>in</strong>d <strong>of</strong> voice <strong>and</strong> image <strong>of</strong> <strong>Africa</strong>. For those <strong>in</strong> the black diaspora, she symbolised a return to an ‘<strong>Africa</strong>nism’ lost to time <strong>and</strong> racial oppression, <strong>and</strong> embodied “a soul style … considered more <strong>Africa</strong>n <strong>in</strong> form, orig<strong>in</strong>, <strong>and</strong> <strong>in</strong>spiration.” Makeba <strong>and</strong> her b<strong>and</strong> exported this style on their very backs. For example, Ford discusses how sharply dressed men <strong>in</strong> Makeba’s b<strong>and</strong>, who would be expected to meet the social norms <strong>of</strong> jazz clubs <strong>in</strong> their local South <strong>Africa</strong>n townships <strong>and</strong> to ma<strong>in</strong>ta<strong>in</strong> an air <strong>of</strong> respectability, became a sort <strong>of</strong> spectacle to behold <strong>in</strong> America, valued aesthetically <strong>and</strong> politically for more than their sound but also for their visible, stylistic l<strong>in</strong>k to <strong>Africa</strong>. Overall, ‘<strong>Africa</strong>’ is h<strong>and</strong>led <strong>in</strong> an unsatisfactory manner <strong>in</strong> the book. It is <strong>of</strong>ten <strong>in</strong>voked as a homogenous place, <strong>and</strong> the essentialised <strong>and</strong> romanticised imag<strong>in</strong>ations <strong>of</strong> it that feed <strong>in</strong>to <strong>Africa</strong>n-American soul-style, such as ideas <strong>of</strong> <strong>Africa</strong> as “motherl<strong>and</strong>” (97), are not deconstructed enough. In her exploration <strong>of</strong> the early days <strong>of</strong> the Black Consciousness Movement <strong>and</strong> the South <strong>Africa</strong>n Students’ Organisation (SASO), Ford assumes but does not conv<strong>in</strong>c<strong>in</strong>gly show that what she has termed soul-style translates <strong>in</strong>to, <strong>and</strong> is shaped by, the same sentiments as ‘the Afro look’ <strong>in</strong> the South <strong>Africa</strong>n context. Similarly, Steve
Biko is also arguably misread to fit <strong>in</strong>to the notion <strong>of</strong> ‘soul’. Important parts <strong>of</strong> the global black struggle <strong>in</strong>tricately l<strong>in</strong>ked to imperialism, capitalism <strong>and</strong> neo colonialism are also not taken <strong>in</strong>to account. Nonetheless, Liberated Threads: Black Women, Style, <strong>and</strong> <strong>The</strong> Global Politics <strong>of</strong> Soul does very important work: sh<strong>in</strong><strong>in</strong>g light on the personal <strong>and</strong> gendered <strong>politics</strong> <strong>of</strong>ten written out <strong>of</strong> gr<strong>and</strong>, patriarchal narratives <strong>of</strong> history, <strong>and</strong> on the gendered complexities <strong>of</strong> past <strong>and</strong>, <strong>in</strong> fact, ongo<strong>in</strong>g struggles for black liberation. Review | 93
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