WEARING PROPAGANDA: Textiles on the Home Front in Japan, Britain, and the United States, 1931-1945

Abstract

Textiles and dress occupy a central position within the realm of material culture. Apart from fulfilling the basic human need for clothing and protection, textiles play important political, economic, and religious functions. Through variations of construction and patterning, cloth also has a great capacity for communication and serves as a significant site of personal and cultural identity. Dress in particular is, by its very nature, one of the most visible of the arts. Yet it is simultaneously one of the most intimate, for while it publicly distinguishes the wearer dress is also a very private matter, one that touches our skin.