Shoddy
From Devil’s Dust to the Renaissance of Rags
- Contents
- Review Quotes
Table of Contents

Contents
Prologue: Finding Shoddy
Old Clothes Odyssey
The Heap
Act I: Devil’s Dust
Emergence of an Industry
Narratives of Transmutation, Myths of Invention
Devil’s Dust Politics
Material Philosophy and the Shredded Self
Shoddy as Paradox and Marx’s “Excrements of Consumption”
Act II: Textile Skin
Act III: Lively Things
Epilogue: Shoddy Renaissance
Old Clothes Odyssey
The Heap
Act I: Devil’s Dust
Emergence of an Industry
Narratives of Transmutation, Myths of Invention
Devil’s Dust Politics
Material Philosophy and the Shredded Self
Shoddy as Paradox and Marx’s “Excrements of Consumption”
Act II: Textile Skin
The Wear of War
Textile Skin and “the Sinews of War”
Shoddy and the Body Politic
Photography and the “Harvest of Death”
On Shrouds and Shoddy
Textile Skin and “the Sinews of War”
Shoddy and the Body Politic
Photography and the “Harvest of Death”
On Shrouds and Shoddy
Act III: Lively Things
Miasma and Contagion
Consolidation of Clothes and Corpses
Disinfection and Its Discontents
The Intimate Materiality of the Unknowable
Liveliness and Formlessness
Consolidation of Clothes and Corpses
Disinfection and Its Discontents
The Intimate Materiality of the Unknowable
Liveliness and Formlessness
Epilogue: Shoddy Renaissance
Acknowledgments
Notes
Works Cited
Index
Notes
Works Cited
Index
Review Quotes
Washington Independent Review of Books
“The fascinating story of how a respectable textile product became synonymous with all things inferior. . . . [Shell] writes with an eye for both vivid visuals and historical links. . . . it’s a fun ride.”
Sherry Turkle, author of Reclaiming Conversation: The Power of Talk in a Digital Age
“Shoddy is that rare book that takes you from the direct experiences you share with the author (what to do with your used clothes? the feeling of ‘doing good’ when you donate them to clothe someone ‘less fortunate’) to the larger social, economic, historical, and, yes, moral universe in which those experiences live. Shell takes us on this kind of journey by searching for shoddy. Through her, we learn about the human costs of the Industrial Revolution, British Chartism, the economic realities of the American Civil War, the ideas that animated dissent—of Carlyle, Disraeli, and Marx, just for a start—and so much more, all through the eyes of shoddy. It is an exemplary book in its use of the visual record to weave a narrative that implicates current practice, not just in how we do scholarship across a range of fields in media and science and technology studies, but how we think about ourselves. Shoddy is a book that will change your mind.”
Sven Beckert, author of Empire of Cotton: A Global History
“As textile consumption exploded in the nineteenth century, discarded cloth gained a second life; it provided the raw material for 'shoddy' fabrics that would enter the homes of enslaved workers, attire Civil War soldiers, and provide material for blankets and mattress fillings. Shell’s fast-paced meditation on the economic, cultural, and ideological histories of shoddy takes you around the world and into some of the most profound questions about capitalism—from its endless capacity for innovation to its unending appetite for ever more resources. Shoddy: From Devil's Dust to the Renaissance of Rags extends the history of the empire of fibers into the most surprising corners of our history and our modern life.”
Hazel Clark, author of The Fabric of Cultures: Fashion, Identity, and Globalization
“This fascinating book, laden with historical insights, takes us on a journey from the nineteenth-century origins of shoddy, made from reclaimed wool in the industrial heart of Yorkshire, to the wider world via contexts of politics, war, contagion, and death. Enlightened by the words of contemporary writers and thinkers and by photographic records, the author explores the many dimensions of a textile that became functionally essential for the likes of army uniforms, blankets, and shrouds. Shoddy offers a timely case study for the possibilities of material recovery and of the critical role of textiles to the human experience; it will appeal to historians, textile experts, and general readers, including those with interest in sustainability and recycling.”
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