Virginia Postrel on Glamour and the Art of Persuasion

Although people often equate them, glamour is not
the same as beauty, stylishness, luxury, celebrity, or sex appeal.
It is not limited to fashion or film; nor is it intrinsically
feminine. It is not a collection of aesthetic markers-a style, as
fashion and design use the word. Glamour is, rather, a form of
nonverbal rhetoric that moves and persuades not through words but
through images, concepts, and totems. Glamour is powerfully
persuasive, argues Virginia Postrel, who sees President Obama as
the most striking recent exemplar.

View this article.