Join us as Dr. Heather Akou, associate professor of fashion design and merchandising in the School of Art, Architecture, and Design at Indiana University Bloomington, explores how fashion collections have influenced the study of fashion. As a scholar with a background in studio art who studies African dress and contemporary Islamic fashion, she will take a critical look at the collecting practices for the Sage Fashion Collection at Indiana University and how connections might be drawn between Western and non-Western fashion. She will also discuss her current work as an editor for Creating African Fashion Histories, including her work with three collections of artifacts held at Indiana University: one from Congo (collected in the 1920s), one from Somalia (1970s), and one from a Nigerian-Ghanaian woman (donated in 2013). Although all collections are valuable, some are better documented and more culturally appropriate than others. This talk examines why the stories behind the collections matter for the study of African fashion.