Stuart Hall Library Clothes Cloth and Culture Group Dr Denise Noble & Dr Christine Checinska

Dr Christine Checinska – Postdoctoral Research Fellow, University of East London

Reconstruction Work

Dr. Christine Checinska has often said that the inspiration of Stuart Hall infuses her work. Taking three ‘encounters’ with the writings Hall as a departure point, Christine will present key aspects of her ongoing research into the relationship between cloth, culture and race. The title of her presentation is borrowed from Hall’s seminal essay, published in Ten-8, in which he discusses images of post-war African-Caribbean settlement in Britain and the problem of writing the history of people on the move. Christine’s current project Crafting Difference engages directly with this ‘problem’, as it explores the connection between crafting, post-colonial life-writing and the suturing of fractured diaspora histories.

The phrase ‘reconstruction work’ captures Christine’s approach to speaking into the absences within the fashion and textiles canon when it comes the African-Caribbean presence and impact.

Dr Denise Noble – Assistant Professor, The Ohio State Universtity

Crochet Doilies and Meanings of Caribbean Immigrant Women’s ‘Domestic Work’

Dr.Denise Noble’s presentation explores the layers of meaning woven into the intricate and colourful doilies handcrafted by Caribbean women immigrants to Britain in the 1950’s and 60’s and how they reveal the complex intersections and ambiguities of gender, race, class, nation and empire in the post-war politics of ‘women’s work’ in Britain.
Dr Denise Noble was born and raised in London of Jamaican parents living for most of her childhood in Shoreditch in the East End. Since 2010 she has been an Assistant Professor of African American and African Studies at the Ohio State University, following several years of teaching Sociology . Media and Cultural Studies at a number of London universities. Dr. Noble’s research specialisms are: the social history of race, gender, and embodiment in the cultural politics of freedom in the Anglophone Caribbean and its diasporas; race and postcoloniality in Britain; diasporicity, transnationality and neoliberal cultural globalization.

An audio recording of Dr. Nobel’s presentation is available below.