Material Culture and Fashion in Tang China and Beyond Rebecca Doran Empire of Style: Silk and Fashion in Tang China by BuYun Chen. Seattle: University of Washington Press, 2019. Pp. xiv + 257. $70.00 cloth, $70.00 e-book. Silk, Slaves, and Stupas: Material Culture of the Silk Road by by Susan Whitfield. Oakland: University of California Press, 2018. Pp. xi + 339. $29.95 cloth, $29.95 e-book. Discussions of the Tang period almost inevitably address, or at least refer to, the dynasty's cosmopolitanism. A complex set of interconnections between the Tang and other kingdoms made it culturally rich and open to a variety of influences. The interstate relationships that contributed to the development of Tang culture and society can be approached from numerous perspectives. These relationships include but are by no means limited to tributary and trade systems, military expansion and foreign policy, and religiously motivated movement into and out of the Tang borders by clergy and laypeople alike. One way to understand and trace the connections between the Tang empire and kingdoms across Eurasia is through the lens of materiality. This material culture encompasses a wide range of articles of clothing, jewelry, decorative objects, items of daily use, and other artistic products, as well as the attendant attitudes toward them and practices surrounding their use. The networks comprising the famed Silk Road, referring to a system of routes across Central Asia and the Middle East, linking Chang'an in the east with Antioch in the west, were crucial to forging [End Page 165] and maintaining ties between the Tang and other kingdoms. They fueled the wealth and lush material culture of the Tang, especially during its first century and a half. This rich materiality is attested in textual, visual, and archaeological sources and remains fundamental to the historical memory of the dynasty. Recent monographs by BuYun Chen and Susan Whitfield adopt groundbreaking, multidisciplinary approaches to material culture in China and beyond. They emphasize the importance of materiality—clothes, textiles, jewelry, bowls, and stupas, among other artifacts—to understanding economic, political, and ideological realities. Chen's Empire of Style: Silk and Fashion in Tang China analyzes the multifaceted Tang fashion system, powered by weavers, artisans, traders, and consumers. Focusing in particular on the significance of silk textiles, Chen utilizes archaeological and textual sources, first, to reconstruct the changing modes of production that drove the creation of these fabrics and, second, to demonstrate the existence of a dynamic fashion culture and consciousness during the Tang. Whitfield's Silk, Slaves, and Stupas: Material Culture of the Silk Road adopts an object-centered approach to the cultural interactions enabled by the Silk Road. It explores the relationships between material items and broader systems of politics, trade, and religion. The monograph traces the creation and movement of ten different objects along the Silk Road and, through this analysis, maps networks of interconnection among artisans, traders, worshippers, and consumers across vast geographic and cultural boundaries. The issues raised and methodologies utilized by both books contribute to ongoing scholarly dialogues and open new directions in the study of material culture, fashion, art, and economic and social history in the Tang and beyond. Empire of Style is divided into two main sections, which unfold progressively to address the ideological and political forces, consumer demand, and logistics of production shaping the development of the Tang fashion system. The monograph begins with an insightful introduction that challenges traditional theories of the genesis of fashion, which have tended to view the emergence of modern fashion culture as inextricably tied to the advent of a capitalist system and commodity culture in nineteenth-century western Europe. Chen debunks the "myth of a static Chinese costume" by introducing what she terms the "tactile and playful world of Tang fashion," a world marked by the [End Page 166] desire for change and "aesthetic play," wherein consumers and wearers used fashion to experiment with social role, image, and perception (pp. 5, 7, 9). Turning to the main body of the book, part 1 comprises two chapters, which explore, respectively, the political and economic developments that enabled the emergence of a cosmopolitan fashion culture during the Tang ("History") and the discursive frameworks through...