In the glorious world of catwalks, glossy magazines, cameras, and couturiers, who were the women behind the smiles and the poses? What secrets really lay behind their legendary beauty? These cameo biographies of the supermodels and haute couture designers and studios who created them reveal an otherwise drab post-war world of incredible elegance and beauty.

Over the last four decades, the fashion modeling industry has become a lightning rod for debates about Western beauty ideals, the sexual objectification of women, and consumer desire. Yet, fashion models still captivate, embodying all that is cool, glam, hip, and desirable. They are a fixture in tabloids, magazines, fashion blogs, and television. Why exactly are models so appealing? And how do these women succeed in so soundly holding our attention? In This Year’s Model, Elizabeth Wissinger weaves together in-depth interviews and research at model castings, photo shoots, and runway shows to offer a glimpse into the life of the model throughout the 20th and 21st centuries. Once an ad hoc occupation, the “model life” now involves a great deal of physical and virtual management of the body, or what Wissinger terms “glamour labor.” Wissinger argues that glamour labor—the specialized modeling work of self-styling, crafting a ‘look,’ and building an image—has been amplified by the rise of digital media, as new technologies make tinkering with the body’s form and image easy. Models can now present self-fashioning, self-surveillance, and self-branding as essential behaviors for anyone who is truly in the know and ‘in fashion.’ Countless regular people make it their mission to achieve this ideal, not realizing that technology is key to creating the unattainable standard of beauty the model upholds—and as Wissinger argues, this has been the case for decades, before Photoshop even existed. Both a vividly illustrated historical survey and an incisive critique of fashion media, This Year’s Model demonstrates the lasting cultural influence of this unique form of embodied labor.

Examining portraits of black people over the past two centuries, Cutting a Figure argues that these images should be viewed as a distinct category of portraiture that differs significantly from depictions of people with other racial and ethnic backgrounds. The difference, Richard Powell contends, lies in the social capital that stems directly from the black subject’s power to subvert dominant racist representations by evincing such traits as self-composure, self-adornment, and self-imagining. Powell forcefully supports this argument with evidence drawn from a survey of nineteenth-century portraits, in-depth case studies of the postwar fashion model Donyale Luna and the contemporary portraitist Barkley L. Hendricks, and insightful analyses of images created since the late 1970s. Along the way, he discusses major artists—such as Frédéric Bazille, John Singer Sargent, James Van Der Zee, and David Hammons—alongside such overlooked producers of black visual culture as the Tonka and Nike corporations. Combining previously unpublished images with scrupulous archival research, Cutting a Figure illuminates the ideological nature of the genre and the centrality of race and cultural identity in understanding modern and contemporary portraiture.

This balanced examination looks at America's pervasive celebrity culture, concentrating on the period from 1950 to the present day. Star Struck: An Encyclopedia of Celebrity Culture is neither a stern critic nor an apologist for celebrity infatuation, a phenomenon that sometimes supplants more weighty matters yet constitutes one of our nation's biggest exports. This encyclopedia covers American celebrity culture from 1950 to 2008, examining its various aspects—and its impact—through 86 entries by 30 expert contributors. Demonstrating that all celebrities are famous, but not all famous people are celebrities, the book cuts across the various entertainment medias and their legions of individual "stars." It looks at sports celebrities and examines the role of celebrity in more serious pursuits and institutions such as the news media, corporations, politics, the arts, medicine, and the law. Also included are entries devoted to such topics as paranoia and celebrity, one-name celebrities, celebrity nicknames, family unit celebrity, sidekick celebrities, and even criminal celebrities.

- An essential reference for students, curators and scholars of fashion, cultural studies, and the expanding range of disciplines that see fashion as imbued with meaning far beyond the material. - Over 300 in-depth entries covering designers, articles of clothing, key concepts and styles. - Edited and introduced by Valerie Steele, a scholar who has revolutionized the study of fashion, and who has been described by The Washington Post as one of "fashion's brainiest women." Derided by some as frivolous, even dangerous, and celebrated by others as art, fashion is anything but a neutral topic. Behind the hype and the glamour is an industry that affects all cultures of the world. A potent force in the global economy, fashion is also highly influential in everyday lives, even amongst those who may feel impervious. This handy volume is a one-stop reference for anyone interested in fashion - its meaning, history and theory. From Avedon to Codpiece, Dandyism to the G-String, Japanese Fashion to Subcultures, Trickle down to Zoot Suit, The Berg Companion to Fashion provides a comprehensive overview of this most fascinating of topics and will serve as the benchmark guide to the subject for many years to come.

In Spaces of Culture an international group of scholars examines the implications of questions such as: What is culture? What is the relationship between social structure and culture in a globalized and networked world? Do critical perspectives still apply, or does the speed and complexity of cultural production demand new forms of analysis? They explore the key themes in social theory: the nation state; the city; modernity and reflexivity; post-Fordism and the spatial logic of the informational city. The contributors go on to analyze the public sphere, questioning the reductive representation of technology as a form of instrumentality, and demonstrating how new technologies can offer new spaces of culture. This analysis of public space is essential to an understanding of issues like global citizenship and multicultural human rights.

From the catwalk to the shopping mall, from the big screen to the art museum, fashion plays an increasingly central role in contemporary culture. Fashion Cultures investigates why we are so fascinated by fashion and the associated spheres of photography, magazines and television, and shopping. Fashion Cultures: * re-addresses the fashionable image, considering the work of designers from Paul Smith to Alexander McQueen and Hussein Chalayan * investigates the radicalism of fashion photography, from William Klein to Corinne Day * considers fashion for the 'unfashionable body' (the old and the big), football and fashion, and geographies of style * explores the relationship between fashion and the moving image in discussions of female cinema icons - from Grace Kelly to Gwyneth Paltrow - and iconic male images - from Cary Grant to Malcolm X and Mr Darcy - that have redefined notions of masculinity and cool * makes a significant intervention into contemporary gender politics and theory, exploring themes such as spectacle, masquerade, and the struggle between fashion and feminism.