What is a zoot suit and When was the zoot suit popular among urban youths in the United States?

Take a very long coat with heavily padded shoulders, add baggy pants with a high waist and tight cuffs, and top it off with a broad-brimmed hat: that’s a zoot suit.

It helps if your hair is cut in a ducktail and you like to dance the jitterbug. The zoot suit was all the rage among urban youths in the 1940s, particularly African Americans and Chicanos.

“Dogs and Mexicans Not Allowed.” – Was a sign posted in the American south in the 1960s, according to visiting Colombian writer Gabriel Garcia Marquez.