Ricky TuckerAnd the Category Is.
Inside New York's Vogue, House, and Ballroom Community
Ricky Tucker is a writer, an educator, and a culture critic based in NYC. His work explores the imprints of art and memory on narrative, and the absurdity of most fleeting moments. He has written for the Paris Review, Tenth Magazine, Literary Hub, and Public Seminar, among others, and has performed for reading series including the Moth Grand SLAM, Sister Spit, Born: Free, and Spark London. His LA Times best-selling debut, And the Category Is . . . : Inside New York’s Vogue, House, and Ballroom Community , was chosen by Pitchfork as one of its 15 Best Music Books of 2022, and is now a finalist for the 2023 Lambda Literary Award for LGBTQ+ Nonfiction. Connect with him at thewriterrickytucker.com.
Preface: Equal Parts Sugar and Shade
CHAPTER 1
Werk—w/the Legendary Pony Zion and Benji Hart (Benji Ninja).
Paris Is Burning, America’s Best Dance Crew, Pose, and Madonna and the art
of appropriation
CHAPTER 2
Memory—w/Lee Soulja
Hidden figures and the history of having a ball
VOGUE ICON: José Xtravaganza
CHAPTER 3
Vogue—w/Arturo Mugler
Learning to vogue, the five elements, and getting your life
CHAPTER 4
The Children—w/Jonovia Chase, Twiggy Pucci Garçon, Gia Love, Luna Luis
Ortiz, Michael Roberson, Robert Sember, and LaLa Zannell
Mothers, fathers, LGBTQ youth, and lost and found families
VOGUE ICON: Leiomy Maldonado
CHAPTER 5
Church—w/MikeQ and Lee Soulja
Clubs and balls as hallowed ground, house music as gospel, and the Theology
of Vogue’ology
VOGUE ICON: Kia Labeija
CHAPTER 6
Realness—w/Gia Love
Walking categories, trans lives, and the unexpected prevalence of gender
norms within the Ballroom scene
VOGUE ICON: Pony Zion
CHAPTER 7
Body—w/Luna Luis Ortiz, LaLa Zannell, and Gia Love
Black trans bodies, body sponsorship, and resolving the trauma in our
bodies
AFTERWORD
My Two Gay Dads—w/Michael Roberson and Robert Sember
The trappings of the not-for-profit industrial complex, 2020 vision,
cosmology, astrology, and theology, the future of Ballroom—and giving it up
to the Universe
Acknowledgments
Notes
Index
