The Elegance of the Common Man: Tango, Consumption, Culture

Abstract

This article is focused on one feature of the politics of good/bad taste in fin-de-siec/e Argentina: male fashion between tango dancers and musicians. Reading a complex archive of memoires, testimonies, scientific and sociological works, I argue that the rise of a male fashion industry troubles sensitive zones of the social imaginary. Cultural discourse debates about the effects of fashion consume between men of the social
margins. Tango, prostitution and marginal urban spaces became his ambience. The article, at the same time, tries to be a miniature archive of the bad taste discourses or the time.