MacKenzie Moon Ryan | Rollins College (original) (raw)

Books by MacKenzie Moon Ryan

FEATURING FIFTY-FOUR ENTRIES of African textiles, clothing, headwear, and jewelry, African Appare... more FEATURING FIFTY-FOUR ENTRIES of African textiles, clothing, headwear, and jewelry, African Apparel: Threaded Transformations across the 20th Century celebrates dress as products of global interactions, generational conflict and continuity, and expressions of gender. Richly illustrated, this catalog highlights the strength and resilience of long-standing practices that characterize African dress; the wide variety of cultural, religious, and political motivations for adorning oneself; and the varying identities reflected in African material culture of the last century and a half. Textile selections include those handwoven and dyed alongside factory-woven and machineprinted cloth, as well as items of adornment including amber and silver jewelry from North Africa, beadwork-embellished clothing from South Africa, and headwear from across the continent.

This unique collection is explored in conversation with
the collector, through an in-depth essay, and with detailed
object entries. From European colonization to independence,
to economic liberalization, African Apparel demonstrates how dress practices reveal personal and group identities, cultural traditions, and aspirations.

Papers by MacKenzie Moon Ryan

Museum Anthropology Review, 2015

Oxford Reference Encyclopedia of African History, 2020

Women have long played a large role in the production (spinning, weaving and dyeing) and consumpt... more Women have long played a large role in the production (spinning, weaving and dyeing) and consumption (sellers, buyers) of fashion and textiles in Africa. Even where men serve more often as weavers (as in West Africa), the dominant buyers and sellers of textiles are women (Nana Benz). Textiles and clothing play a large role in women’s wealth. Textiles are required at momentous occasions throughout the lives of women (for example at adolescent rites, engagement and marriage, births of children, and as burial shrouds).

Furthermore, fashion systems are dominated by women designers, seamstresses and tailors. Wrapped textiles and tailored clothing are sites where women have actively participated in defining their own identities. Research has illuminated their varied roles in the last century and a half, from precolonial fashion systems and textile production, to colonial-era contested sites of the body (missionaries), womanhood, and burgeoning independence, to independence-era struggles for nationalisms, freedom, and women’s independence (from men, their families, and gendered expectations), to contemporary proliferations in both everyday and high fashion apparel. From rebellious, modern youths in miniskirts to upstanding citizens as the standard bearer for national dress traditions, how women in Africa have dressed themselves in fashion and textiles illuminates historical struggles, change, and episodic flashpoints across the continent.

Textile History, 2017

This article examines the early development of printed and manufactured cotton kanga textiles, wo... more This article examines the early development of printed and manufactured cotton kanga textiles, worn popularly throughout East Africa by women as wrappers. Using archival, pictorial and object collections, I suggest that the decade from 1876 to 1886 was crucial for design. The bold colour and graphics of East African women’s cloth printing, Indonesian batik motifs, European-printed handkerchief-style borders and the inclusion of text combined by 1886 to form the now standard composition of kanga cloth.

Textile Trades, Consumer Cultures, and the Material Worlds of the Indian Ocean: An Ocean of Cloth, 2018

The fashionable printed textile known today as kanga emerged from a complex history of global tra... more The fashionable printed textile known today as kanga emerged from a complex history of global trade networks responding to local East African consumer demands. Initially imported to African from Europe, this factory-woven cloth printed with colorful designs developed out of converging western Indian Ocean trades in industrially manufactured textiles, as well as late ninteenth-century technological advances in synthetic dyes and printing techniques. This essay provides the first art historical analysis of production. I demonstrate how the cloth type grew out of previous demands for indigo-dyed cotton cloth from India and unbleached plain-weave cotton cloth from the USA; the widespread adoption of newly invented synthetic dyes to create brightly colored cloths; advances in printing technologies to create highly defined, repeating patterns cheaply; and the design influence of square printed handkerchiefs. The kanga as we know it today emerged by 1886.

World on the Horizon: Swahili Arts Across the Indian Ocean, 2018

In this essay I establish the origins of kanga cloth and explore its colonial history. I focus on... more In this essay I establish the origins of kanga cloth and explore its colonial history. I focus on the era between the 1880s and the 1960s, to show how a wide range of players worked together and competed with each other to create, market, and see kanga cloth. At least three different parties were involved in tech creation of new kanga designs during the colonial era, prior to the cloth's acquisition by East African women consumers: manufacturers, distributors, and sellers, who often also served as designers.

Conference Presentations by MacKenzie Moon Ryan

Textile Society of America Symposium Proceedings, 2016

This paper seeks to answer the questions: How have kanga textiles been designed throughout the pa... more This paper seeks to answer the questions: How have kanga textiles been designed throughout the past? How are kanga designers educated today? What new demands are contributing to contemporary kanga production?

Book Reviews by MacKenzie Moon Ryan

Textile Society of America, 2016

Symposium panel review from the Textile Society of America 15th Biennial Symposium, Crosscurrents... more Symposium panel review from the Textile Society of America 15th Biennial Symposium, Crosscurrents: Land, Labor and the Port, Savannah, GA. 28, no. 2, 2016.

Museum Anthropology Review, 2015

Book review of Heather Marie Akou's Politics of Dress in Somali Culture, published in Museum Anth... more Book review of Heather Marie Akou's Politics of Dress in Somali Culture, published in Museum Anthropology Review, Vol. 9, no. 2, 2015.

African Arts, 2016

Review of exhibition, Kabas and Couture: Contemporary Ghanaian Fashion, on view at the Barn Museu... more Review of exhibition, Kabas and Couture: Contemporary Ghanaian Fashion, on view at the Barn Museum of Art in Gainesville, Florida, from February 24-August 23, 2015. Curated by Christopher Richards. Published in African Arts, vol. 49, no. 2, 2016.

FEATURING FIFTY-FOUR ENTRIES of African textiles, clothing, headwear, and jewelry, African Appare... more FEATURING FIFTY-FOUR ENTRIES of African textiles, clothing, headwear, and jewelry, African Apparel: Threaded Transformations across the 20th Century celebrates dress as products of global interactions, generational conflict and continuity, and expressions of gender. Richly illustrated, this catalog highlights the strength and resilience of long-standing practices that characterize African dress; the wide variety of cultural, religious, and political motivations for adorning oneself; and the varying identities reflected in African material culture of the last century and a half. Textile selections include those handwoven and dyed alongside factory-woven and machineprinted cloth, as well as items of adornment including amber and silver jewelry from North Africa, beadwork-embellished clothing from South Africa, and headwear from across the continent.

This unique collection is explored in conversation with
the collector, through an in-depth essay, and with detailed
object entries. From European colonization to independence,
to economic liberalization, African Apparel demonstrates how dress practices reveal personal and group identities, cultural traditions, and aspirations.

Museum Anthropology Review, 2015

Oxford Reference Encyclopedia of African History, 2020

Women have long played a large role in the production (spinning, weaving and dyeing) and consumpt... more Women have long played a large role in the production (spinning, weaving and dyeing) and consumption (sellers, buyers) of fashion and textiles in Africa. Even where men serve more often as weavers (as in West Africa), the dominant buyers and sellers of textiles are women (Nana Benz). Textiles and clothing play a large role in women’s wealth. Textiles are required at momentous occasions throughout the lives of women (for example at adolescent rites, engagement and marriage, births of children, and as burial shrouds).

Furthermore, fashion systems are dominated by women designers, seamstresses and tailors. Wrapped textiles and tailored clothing are sites where women have actively participated in defining their own identities. Research has illuminated their varied roles in the last century and a half, from precolonial fashion systems and textile production, to colonial-era contested sites of the body (missionaries), womanhood, and burgeoning independence, to independence-era struggles for nationalisms, freedom, and women’s independence (from men, their families, and gendered expectations), to contemporary proliferations in both everyday and high fashion apparel. From rebellious, modern youths in miniskirts to upstanding citizens as the standard bearer for national dress traditions, how women in Africa have dressed themselves in fashion and textiles illuminates historical struggles, change, and episodic flashpoints across the continent.

Textile History, 2017

This article examines the early development of printed and manufactured cotton kanga textiles, wo... more This article examines the early development of printed and manufactured cotton kanga textiles, worn popularly throughout East Africa by women as wrappers. Using archival, pictorial and object collections, I suggest that the decade from 1876 to 1886 was crucial for design. The bold colour and graphics of East African women’s cloth printing, Indonesian batik motifs, European-printed handkerchief-style borders and the inclusion of text combined by 1886 to form the now standard composition of kanga cloth.

Textile Trades, Consumer Cultures, and the Material Worlds of the Indian Ocean: An Ocean of Cloth, 2018

The fashionable printed textile known today as kanga emerged from a complex history of global tra... more The fashionable printed textile known today as kanga emerged from a complex history of global trade networks responding to local East African consumer demands. Initially imported to African from Europe, this factory-woven cloth printed with colorful designs developed out of converging western Indian Ocean trades in industrially manufactured textiles, as well as late ninteenth-century technological advances in synthetic dyes and printing techniques. This essay provides the first art historical analysis of production. I demonstrate how the cloth type grew out of previous demands for indigo-dyed cotton cloth from India and unbleached plain-weave cotton cloth from the USA; the widespread adoption of newly invented synthetic dyes to create brightly colored cloths; advances in printing technologies to create highly defined, repeating patterns cheaply; and the design influence of square printed handkerchiefs. The kanga as we know it today emerged by 1886.

World on the Horizon: Swahili Arts Across the Indian Ocean, 2018

In this essay I establish the origins of kanga cloth and explore its colonial history. I focus on... more In this essay I establish the origins of kanga cloth and explore its colonial history. I focus on the era between the 1880s and the 1960s, to show how a wide range of players worked together and competed with each other to create, market, and see kanga cloth. At least three different parties were involved in tech creation of new kanga designs during the colonial era, prior to the cloth's acquisition by East African women consumers: manufacturers, distributors, and sellers, who often also served as designers.

Textile Society of America Symposium Proceedings, 2016

This paper seeks to answer the questions: How have kanga textiles been designed throughout the pa... more This paper seeks to answer the questions: How have kanga textiles been designed throughout the past? How are kanga designers educated today? What new demands are contributing to contemporary kanga production?

Textile Society of America, 2016

Symposium panel review from the Textile Society of America 15th Biennial Symposium, Crosscurrents... more Symposium panel review from the Textile Society of America 15th Biennial Symposium, Crosscurrents: Land, Labor and the Port, Savannah, GA. 28, no. 2, 2016.

Museum Anthropology Review, 2015

Book review of Heather Marie Akou's Politics of Dress in Somali Culture, published in Museum Anth... more Book review of Heather Marie Akou's Politics of Dress in Somali Culture, published in Museum Anthropology Review, Vol. 9, no. 2, 2015.

African Arts, 2016

Review of exhibition, Kabas and Couture: Contemporary Ghanaian Fashion, on view at the Barn Museu... more Review of exhibition, Kabas and Couture: Contemporary Ghanaian Fashion, on view at the Barn Museum of Art in Gainesville, Florida, from February 24-August 23, 2015. Curated by Christopher Richards. Published in African Arts, vol. 49, no. 2, 2016.