Zoot Suit

For the film, see Zoot Suit. For the song by Cherry Poppin Daddies, see Zoot Suit Riot.

Soldier inspecting zoot suits in Washington D.C. in 1942.

A zoot suit is a style of clothing popularized by African Americans, Filipino Americans, and Mexican Americans in the late 1930s and 1940s. It has wide-legged, tight-cuffed, or "pegged," trousers (called tramas); and a long coat with wide lapels, and wide, padded shoulders (called the carlango). Often zoot suiters wear a felt hat with a long feather (called a tapa or tanda) and pointy, French-style shoes (called calcos). A young Malcolm X described the zoot suit as: "a killer-diller coat with a drape shape, reet pleats and shoulders padded like a lunatic's cell."

Zoot suits first gained popularity in Harlem jazz culture in the late 1930s where they were called "drapes". [link] The word "zoot", according to the Oxford English Dictionary, probably comes from a reduplication of the word 'suit'. It was probably first coined by Mexican American pachucos as part of their slang, "Calo". They were extremely popular with the African-American and Filipino-American youth, and also with young Latinos, most particularly, among those Mexican American youths who styled themselves as "pachucos" in Los Angeles. In March of 1942, the War Production Board banned zoot suit production - allegedly because it deemed the style wasteful of valuable suiting material during wartime, but the measure was taken in a climate of general anxiety and fear of latino youths. The fashion persisted, despite restrictions placed on the amount of fabric in the production of garments.

It has been suggested that zoot suits originated as a passive protest to measures during World War II to limit nationwide consumption of many items due to war needs.^{[[Citing sources citation needed]]} This is unlikely, as they were fashionable in Black, Latino, and Filipino communities long before the imposition of such restrictions.^{[[Citing sources citation needed]]}

Zoot Suits were satirized by Al Capp in 1943 in the comic strip Li'l Abner, in which Abner Yokum appeared as "Zoot Suit Yokum," a gullible but near-indestructible man chosen by a clothing manufacturer to serve as role model for white youth through dangerous, staged heroic feats. The story ended with mainstream businessmen also taking to the zoot suit, whereupon it suddenly went out of style.

This type of suit inspired the album Zoot Suit Riot, by the American band Cherry Poppin' Daddies. The name of the song was based on the riots caused by military personnel during WWII, who would beat up any Latino they found wearing a Zoot Suit in Los Angeles.

Zoot Suit is also the name of a musical play by written by Luis Valdez, featuring music from Daniel Valdez and Lalo Guerrero, the "father of Chicano music." When it debuted in 1979, Zoot Suit was the first Chicano play on Broadway. In 1981, Luis Valdez also directed filmed version of the play.

External links

[Zoot Suit History Summary]

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Zoot Suit

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