CFP - Special Issue of Critical Studies in Men’s Fashion Underwear

Call for Papers

Special Issue of Critical Studies in Men’s Fashion Underwear

Editors: Shaun Cole and Jonathan Allan

Website: https://www.intellectbooks.com/critical-studies-in-mens-fashion

Abstracts due for review: 26th March 2021

Authors notified of decisions: 1st May 2021

Completed articles due: 1st September 2021

In 1994, while taking part in Enough Is Enough hosted by MTV, Bill Clinton was asked ‘Boxers or Briefs?’ to which he replied ‘usually briefs’. This question imagines underwear as an either/or choice for men. One can hardly imagine a similar question for women given the enormous industry and marketplace, where brands are household names. Meanwhile, Jerry Seinfeld quips that, ‘Men want the same thing for their underwear that they want from women: a little bit of support, and a little bit of freedom.’ Seinfeld’s remark is illustrative of what this special issue seeks to understand, what do men want from their underwear? Is underwear, for instance, merely functional or is there something aesthetic or luxurious about underwear? This special volume welcomes contributions that think about men, masculinities, and underwear – not only as wearers of underwear, but as consumers of underwear, models of underwear. While theories of masculinities now speak of ‘decreasing homophobia’ and ‘hybrid masculinities’, how do these theories account for fashion and clothing, especially the less seen fashion of underwear?Building on earlier work on this topic in Critical Studies of Men’s Fashion(1.2), special issue welcomes contributions that think about underwear, men, and masculinities – as wearers, consumers and models of underwear – and how contemporary theories of masculinities account for fashion and clothing, especially the less seen fashion of underwear. Topics may include, but are not limited to:

• underwear and media (in cinema, television, the novel, magazines and music)

• underwear and advertising (Jockey ‘Feel like a Million’, 1970s Paris Underflair, Mark Wahlberg’s iconic Calvin Klein ad, Men of Moonlight and Calvin Klein, advertising on television)

• underwear and the marketplace, men as consumers (Alan Greenspan and the Men’s Underwear Index)

• historical analyses of underwear (Shaun Cole’s The Story of Underwear; Richard Martin’s notion of ‘shift from health to happiness following WWII’)

• bodies and underwear (body-shaping garments; fat, skinny bodies, differently abled bodies, trans bodies, and underwear)

• intersectional approaches (age, sex, gender, race, religion, ability, sexuality, etc.)

• technology and underwear (wearing boxers for infertility; Snowballs and cooling technology; Saxx’s ‘Ballpark Pouch’)

• fabric, textile, and shape of underwear (boxers or briefs, low rise or high rise, jocks, thongs, cotton. Wool, modal etc.)

• underwear, sexuality and eroticism.

Please e-mail a Word or PDF abstract of 150–200 words to the guest editors, Shaun Cole (s.r.cole@soton.ac.uk) and Jonathan A. Allan (allanj@brandonu.ca) by 26th March 2021. Abstracts’ submissions should include a title, keywords, approximate word count including references, author’s full name, affiliation, contact details and a short biography of 3–5 sentences. The editor will aim to let prospective authors know their final decision as soon as possible.

Full manuscripts’ deadline is 1st September 2021. All submissions must follow Intellect’s house style. Manuscripts should be a maximum of 7000 words. It is the author’s responsibility to clear the usage rights for all images to be published.