MODA AFRO - AFRO (NA) MODA: REFLEXÕES SOBRE O CONSUMO DE MODA AFRO E RELAÇÕES IDENTITÁRIAS EM DUAS DIÁSPORAS AMERICANAS

Abstract

This thesis investigates how ethnic identities are constructed and expressed through the consumption of Afro fashion in two central cities of the Black diaspora in the Americas: Salvador (Brazil) and New York (USA). Drawing from the fields of consumer anthropology and racial studies, the research seeks to understand the role of Afro fashion in the (re)affirmation of Blackness, as well as who produces and consumes these cultural goods, and with what motivations. The investigation articulates multi-sited ethnography (with participant observation conducted in both cities), autoethnography, semi-structured interviews with producers and consumers, in addition to some virtual ethnographic analyses. The results indicate that, although Afro fashion is consolidated in the consumer market, it is traversed by racism and market disputes in both territorial poles. Consumption, in turn, reveals itself as a practice of belonging, reclaiming identity, a sense of community, and image construction, operating simultaneously as an aesthetic, political, and affective gesture. It can be concluded that Afro fashion acts as a device for identity agency in diasporas and as a field for the elaboration of visual narratives that reconfigure the Black presence in contemporary urban spaces.