From Rosa Parks to Angela Davis, Dress Was a Form of Protest

Although style-conscious activism may seem like anathema to many in the current generation of female activists—including some of those descending upon D.C. tomorrow for the Women’s March on Washington—it’s worth remembering how earlier generations drew on the power of dress to advance social progress.

During the civil rights era, the “Sunday Best” look was de rigueur at nonviolent protests. Appearing polished and put-together brought a serious undertone to the proceedings and demanded that the activists be taken seriously as citizens. Donning Castleberry tweed suits and delicate strands of pearls as she marched alongside her husband, Coretta Scott King was the personification of grace under fire. The de facto first lady of the movement, there was not a curl in her marcel wave out of place as the mother of four stood up at rallies. Women’s and civil rights activist Dorothy Height couldn’t be ignored in her signature church hats—a vibrant and ladylike way to accessorize the professional business suits she wore when taking on lawmakers on Capitol Hill.

Diane Nash, the gutsy organizer with the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC) and Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC), looked like a prim and proper model—making the image of her being arrested countless times at demonstrations all the more jarring. Fannie Lou Hamer, the Mississippi-born firebrand and daughter of sharecroppers whose forceful vocals disrupted the Democratic Convention of 1964, attended voting rights protests in spirited frocks and a prim pocketbook by her side.

Effective and vigilant, these smartly attired leaders helped usher in major legislative victories—from the Voting Rights Act of 1965 to the Civil Rights Act of 1968—that largely struck down the Jim Crow laws. But in the late ’60s, a major shift in politics—and style—occurred, during which a much more militant group responded to a younger generation’s call for swifter action and feistier leadership. Enter the Black Panther Party.

Donning their signature black turtlenecks, leather trenchcoats, and berets over the tufts of their Afros, the party spoke of black self-determination in the face of massive urban blight and heavy police surveillance. And alongside the BPP’s domineering cadre of black male leadership stood women like Kathleen Cleaver, Elaine Brown, and Angela Davis, who espoused the party’s beliefs from head to toe. Sporting Afros and embracing what Cleaver once described as a “new awareness . . . that their own natural, physical appearance is beautiful,” these leaders and their crowns of natural curls came to reflect a new pride in one’s appearance—a striking visual marker of black identity.