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Bad Rap for a Neck Scarf?

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 May 2009

Ted Swedenburg*
Affiliation:
Department of Anthropology, University of Arkansas, Fayetteville, Ark.; e-mail: tsweden@uark.edu

Extract

Do purple designer kufiyas spell the end of Palestine solidarity?

Kufiyas, especially multicolored ones, started becoming fashionable U.S. urban hipster wear around 2005. They are so trendy, in fact, that W's Meggan Crum called the restyled kufiya featured in French designer Nicholas Ghesquière's fall 2007 Balenciaga fashion line, and worn by Brazilian supermodel Flavia de Oliveira, one of “Fall 2007's Top Ten Accessories.” Meanwhile, over the last couple of years, kufiyas of all colors have been spotted on such celebrities as Mary-Kate Olsen, Kirsten Dunst, Cameron Diaz, Colin Farrell, David Beckham, Justin Timberlake, and even John McCain's daughter Meghan. In spring 2007, Urban Outfitters marketed the kufiya, in several colors, as an “anti-war woven scarf” until protests prompted the cancellation of the line—but not the sale of the item. It is available in the winter 2008 catalog, described now as a “houndstooth scarf.”

Type
Quick Studies
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2009

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References

NOTES

1 Style.com website, http://www.style.com/fashionshows/collections/F2007RTW/editor/041207 (accessed 19 July 2007).

2 “People, Not Places,” Expressions of Nakba Gallery, the U.S. Campaign to End the Occupation, 2008, http://expressionsofnakba.org/gallery/node/85 (accessed 5 January 2009).