Wednesday, October 12
6:30pm | lecture in Whiteman Lecture Hall
7:30pm | ACI Member reception on terrace
Join fashion history scholar, curator, and educator Dr. Michael Mamp for a sashay down fashion’s queer lane. The LGBTQ+ community has frequently used fashion as a mode of expression while simultaneously influencing mainstream trends throughout history. Join Mamp as he overviews queer identity and fashion, starting with Marie Antoinette, fashion's quintessential Queen (pun intended). From the eighteenth century to the present day, we will explore the fashions of dandyism, the interwar period, female impersonators, drag queens, camp culture, and much more.
About the Speaker:
Michael Mamp, Ph.D. (he/him), is an Associate Professor of fashion and textile history at Louisiana State University (LSU) and incoming LSU Textile & Costume Collection Curator. As a fashion and textile historian, Dr. Mamp uses material culture and archival sources to unravel the hidden histories of American fashion and textiles of the twentieth century. As a critical fashion scholar, queer and feminist theoretical frameworks contextualize his analysis of dress as an expression of intersectional identities. He endeavors to expand the body of knowledge related to the history of women and the LGBTQ+ community. He has published his research in journals including Dress, The Journal of Modern Craft, and Fashion, Style, and Popular Culture. He is an award-winning fashion and textile history scholar and educator often quoted in national news outlets such as the New York Post, Huffington Post, and Bloomberg News Radio, among many others. He has curated several fashion exhibitions. A recent collaboration is the exhibition Threads of Life, Love, and Loss: An HIV/AIDS Story, on view now at Cornell University. Dr. Mamp developed and taught the first Queer Fashion course in the United States, which he has now introduced to the curriculum of two different universities. He is Associate Editor of Critical Studies in Fashion and Beauty and, in 2018, was inducted as a member of the Scholar’s Roundtable of the Costume Society of America. At LSU, Dr. Mamp teaches courses, including History of Modern Fashion, History of Textiles, and Queer Fashion.
Image Credit: “Male Actress,” Charles Pierce, c. 1988. Photo courtesy of the ONE Archives, University of Southern California.