Dressed In Dreams: A Black Girls Love Letter to Fashion is a book by Dr. Tanisha C. Ford. Tanisha C. Ford is an award winning writer, professor, and cultural critic. According to her professional biography, “Her work centers on social movement history, philanthropy and the cultural politics of money, Black feminism(s), material culture, the built environment, black life in the Rust Belt, girlhood studies, and fashion and body politics.” As you can see she does not limit herself to one certain thing and has various works that range in topics.
This is a great book if you love fashion and love story telling. I really like the way that she has certain pieces of clothing to help pinpoint a certain piece of time. A book that touches on many points of living life and growing up as a minority, she intertwines clothing, accesories, and shoes. She brings up ways that these items not only were part of her upbringing but also coming of age. Helps shine a light on fashion from an African American stand piont.
Immaculate Story Telling
In her book Dr. Ford explains her life by each chaper being a different article of clothing, accessories or shoe. She talks about her childhood, to being a teenager, becoming a young adult and then guiding through adulthood and current political climate. She articulates very well from each chapter/articles of fashion. It doesn’t jump around and not make sense and it all meshes well. The reader becomes hooked on her recounts of events and imagine like you are there with her. It also helps that each chapter is roughly around 20 pages so you really have time to become engaged and become emerged in the book.
Additionally, her writing is very descriptive and you can just visualizes what she is talking about in your mind. When she speaks about an experience of going shopping with her mother and trying on leather jackets. From describing the scent of leather to the way the store looked lied with leather and suede jackets, you feel as if you are there with Tanisha and her mother.
Connects with the audience
Throughout her book Ford speaks about various experiences that many reader could relate. From fashion to self care and upbringing and growing up. There is surely a time or experience that you could share or relate with Dr. Ford and feel somewhat seen in a sense. For example, she speaks on how Dashikis were part of her wardrobe growing up as her parents were really into wearing that and she gets into the background it had with African American people trying to reconnect with their African roots. She not only connects the clothing with personal experiences but with the black community as well helping to show why the print and style became prominent in western society.
Additionally, she talks about an instance growing up where she felt not good enough when on a vacation with friends. She talks about how she felt as she could not fit in as well because of her clothes and how she felt insecure around a friend because of how she looked. Ford can relate to the reader with her vulnerable side because many people have felt insecure when wearing something because they have felt they don’t look good in certain clothes. Moreover,She felt that she would look better if she had a body like her friends, rather than the one that she had. She’s showing how society makes us not feel good about ourselves because we don’t look or have the ideal features that they want us to have or look like.
Furthermore, she tells her story of growing up in a rough neighborhood that had gang activity. In this instance she speaks about an incident she saw first hand about someone getting beat up for wearing the wrong color of shoes because of gang affiliation. While I have never been in a gang; I did grow up in a neighborhood that had gangs and growing up I knew that you could not wear certain color combinations because if you did gang members would think you are affiliated or people in general would. This was also something that was punished by school because if you were certain colors they would make you put in your gym uniform for the rest of the day for going against dress code (I.e wearing gang affiliated colors.)
This is just three of the many instances that give relatable moments to the audience. But she had many many more that many minorities men or woman can relate to. From trying to live and learn in a predominately white setting to being a mother at a young age to learning how to love yourself as an adult. There is a range of things Ford speaks about that you could be able to relate and learn from. These just ranged from connecting with the black community, connecting with girls and woman, and connecting with someone who lives in an area with similar dynamics. Truly connecting various people with different backgrounds.
She’s Real
In her book, Ford does not put her self in a pedestal. She does not think she is the victim, on the contrary, she believes that everything that has happened happened for a reason. While she speaks of the good of her. She also mentions the bad. She talks about it and how it made her learn and grow to become the person who she is now. (I don’t want to mention any of the good or bad because I believe you should read the book ! Lol)
Hopefully this small review has got you intrigued and want to you to know more about her story and the story of also black fashion. I know many people will be able to connect and relate in what way or another. As she is someone who always went for her goals and didn’t let something stop her. She connects with the reader by talking about experiences others may have gone through themselves or heard of by others close to them. Specifically for Black Women.
Moreover, this book helped me realized that many cultures have similar ideals in culture when it comes to genders and gender roles (she speaks about this in her book, but I didn’t want to give much away about it) and how to grow up and live life. Also how things in one part of the country decades ago can still be prevalent and known. How youth culture spread through the country before the internet and how knocks off helped this happen by creating an access to something which people normally don’t have access too. (Another topic she talks about in the book !) This book will surely become a favorite.
Also it had been reported by Black Film and TV that there is works with Sony Pictures in collaboration with Gabrielle Union and Frida Pinto for a TV adaptation of Dr. Fords Memoir. I’m hoping this goes well!
Let me know in the comments if you’ve read this book before and thoughts. Or if you plan to read it. 🙂
J’s Journal 