Sociology Of Fashion Research Paper

1. The Scope Of Fashion

Knowing what is ‘right for today’ appears to be fundamental to all periods and societies. It was only at the turn of the twentieth century, however, that fashion became the subject of serious sociological study. Its universal nature taken as read, much has been made of its growing importance. People’s lives have been increasingly affected in new ways, while more of the general population has the chance to follow fashion. Sapir (1931) contrasts fashion’s functional irrelevance with its tremendous symbolic significance. This explains in part why fashion can affect so much. While usually expressed outwardly in clothing and adornment, there is nothing to prevent modes of thought, morals, art, and the like from being the equivalent of clothing fashions.

More recently, attention has been drawn to fashion’s growing importance to the general population. Fashion was once a limited phenomenon, with very few in a society able to participate. In modern societies, however, increasing numbers have become conscious followers of fashion. Economic well-being has made it possible for the vast majority to participate in the ‘fashion race.’ Wealth is not the only factor, however; people also enjoy far greater psychological mobility, and the new form of communication it generates makes fashion more important today. In Psychologie economique (1902), Tarde coined the term ‘inter-psycholgie.’ Society is the sum of people’s mental condition in constant interaction. Free time and consumption become increasingly significant vehicles for such communication. New needs are born out of this mental interaction.

2. Fashion In Different Societies

Fashion’s universal nature does not preclude strong variations in its social significance from society to society. Thus, Tarde (1903) differentiated between customary and fashionable societies. In the former, people see custom as governing their lives; they are more passionate about their country than about their period because custom prizes the past above all. In periods where fashion predominates, people are instead prouder of their era than their country.

Variations between societies are thrown up by different conditions. In economically stagnant periods, conventional stratification variables such as class and income are more decisive in people’s lifestyles. In economically expansive periods, increasing importance is laid on fashion instead. Modern society is often contrasted with earlier epochs, and it is argued that fashion’s role has markedly increased, although many reasons are given for the change. An influential argument is that the differences in lifestyle of different groups have increased in number and scope, making it possible for people to exhibit their group’s distinctive nature.

Simmel sees the ‘need for distinction’ and the ‘need for union’ as preconditions for fashion. Certain societies therefore lack the necessary motivation. Simmel (1904) here mentions that in fourteenth century Florence, male dress was devoid of fashion. The ‘need for union,’ the need to express how certain groups were distinct from others with the help of fashion, was absent, and everyone could dress according to personal preference. Another of Simmel’s examples was Venice at the same time. Again we find that fashion is absent from upper-class dress. Venetian aristocrats were ordered to dress in black so that the lower classes would not know how few they were. They did not want to differentiate themselves, and thus the ‘need for distinction’ that fashion requires was missing.

Variations in fashion’s importance have also been tied to women’s standing in society. According to Veblen (1899), it was woman’s role to be a vicarious consumer; her consumption symbolized the man’s wealth, and thus she became the vehicle of fashion. In Simmel (1904), however, we find an early formulation of compensation theory. Fashion acts as a safety valve. Deny women self-expression in other areas, and the only thing left for them is fashion. In fourteenthand fifteenth-century Germany, the chance of personal development had increased, which, however, was denied to women. Rarely have more ‘hypertrophic’ modes of female dress been seen than in this period.

Simmel (1904) further explains fashion differences between societies. Fashion has two fundamental, symbolic functions: an ability to mark difference and an ability to express community. In many nonindustrialized societies, the need for union is acute, while the need for distinction is weak. Simmel mentions certain African tribes who lacked both class differentiation and the concomitant need to signal differences. Where people in these societies want to note differences, it is often a matter of open hostility, which in turn is sterile ground for fashion. Given that fashion functions best where the distance between groups is otherwise only vaguely established, in instances where open hostility already exists, fashion as a sociological form becomes meaningless.

A similar argument can be found in Konig (1974), who identifies three different stages in society, each with a different type of fashion. The first significant historical change was the emergence of a fixed class hierarchy; at this stage, fashion is the preserve of an exclusive, feudal nobility. In the second stage, rigid differences between upper and lower classes are weakened; lower classes adopt the fashion of the elite, ultimately forcing it to alter fashion constantly to retain its individuality. The third stage sees the development of egalitarian democracies and industrial technology. This modern form of society brings with it the spread of fashion through mass consumption.

3. Fashion As A Process Of Change

Fashion prescribes what is ‘the right thing’ for ‘now.’ The question of what drives fashion’s continuous changes has kept researchers busy, and a series of different theories has been given in answer. In Simmel’s analysis of fashion we find a foretaste of many of the theories that were to follow.

The theory of social differentiation argues that fashion is based on class, the upper classes abandoning a fashion as soon as it is adopted by the lower classes (see Sect. 3.1). The theory of fashion’s internal dynamic contends that changes are powered by an Eigendynamik in fashion (see Sect. 3.2). The theory of fashion as a manifestation of the expression for other social change is a variant of spirit of the age theory (see Sect. 3.3). Additionally, different system theories of fashion have been proposed, pointing to various factors, for example fashion producers, that accelerate the speed with which fashion changes (see Sect. 3.4). Theories of fashion as a violation of convention argue that fashion always breaks with the past, for example with prevailing conventions and fashions (see Sect. 3.5). Finally, there are theories of fashion as a channel of psychological and social needs for expression (see Sect. 3.6).

3.1 Social Differentiation

Many have stressed fashion’s origins in class. The analysis by Veblen (1899) of patterns of fashion dispersal has become a classic. A fashion begins with the ‘leisure class,’ the group with most money. It is attractive to this class because fashion items cost a great deal more. By degrees the fashion spreads to the upwardly aspiring middle classes. Simmel (1904) also describes how fashion must constantly be supplied with new content if it is to give social expression both to similarities within groups and differences between them. To describe fashion’s downward spread through society, the trickle-down model was adopted by Barber and Lobel (1953), who dismissed the argument that fashion is irrational as obscuring its connections with the economic system. Meanwhile, named for the imitation of the elite that brings in turn an alteration in elite habits, we have the chase and flight model and the paper chase model.

Bell (1976) follows Veblen in seeing economic competition as a force behind changes in fashion. Dress for the middle and upper classes is an expression of wealth. This wealth can take the form of conspicuous consumption, conspicuous leisure, and conspicuous waste. To these, Bell adds his own category of conspicuous outrage to convey the fashion-setting class’ conscious choice of clothing that does not conform with prevailing notions of good taste.

The theory that fashion is the means of social distinction for the upper classes in a hierarchical society has had great influence. Mimicry of social superiors and an urge to be different from ‘inferiors’ are often noted as the reasons for fashion’s changes, while an individual’s choice of style is seen as a significant means of securing his or her position in society. Such choices often establish their distance from those below them in the social pecking order, and express subtle distinctions of degree within one and the same class. Researchers who present other models often start from the theory of social differentiation, even if they distance themselves from its application to today’s society. Some reason that the idea that fashion was the distinguishing mark of the elite was probably valid in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, but not today. It has been argued that the traditional upper class has lost its fashion primacy to be replaced, for example, by today’s powerless elite. This new elite, termed Di i by Alberoni (1967), uses the mass media to present new lifestyles and new consumption.

3.2 Fashion’s Inner Dynamic

Simmel’s analysis included a further suggestion of what drives fashion. Fashion is made up of internal, conflicting forces that necessarily lead to change; it is distinguished by both differentiation and union, superficiality and profundity, freedom and dependence, individuality and imitation, destruction and construction, leadership and submission. Antagonistic forces are united in fashion in a way that ensures continual change. Nedelmann (1990) develops the idea of the inherently contradictory nature of fashion, describing its Eigendynamik. Fashion, by its nature, contains a stimulus for change derived from polar opposites. People like to imitate, thus spreading a certain fashion, but are equally drawn to differentiation. Imitation leads to the spread of fashion, while innovation and differentiation lead to its contraction. Nedelmann invokes Simmel, writing that the greater the degree of concord within the upper classes, the more frantic the search for imitation from beneath, and the more constant the search for new fashions by the upper classes. On the other hand, the more the members of the lower classes use style to differentiate between themselves, the less the upper classes are inclined to come up with new fashions. Fashion in this society thus has less significance.

Davis (1992) has also noted the ambivalence of fashion, and identifies its source in sexuality. Davis writes of a continuous dialectic in clothing between the erotic and the modest. Sellerberg (1994) similarly stresses the significance of antagonism as a driving force of change. Fashion reduces and creates complexity. It is a continuous break with authority, but its break is authoritative: ‘this is what matters, for now.’ In this contradiction one finds the motor of change.

3.3 Fashion As An Expression Of The Spirit Of The Age

A given fashion draws a line between the present and the past, expressing what is right ‘for the day’: fashion represents the present. This view is the basis for theories that fashion is the spirit of the age. Fashion not only grows out of the designers’ world view, but also simply reflects a time. Laver (1937), who worked mainly on dress, drew up a fashion timetable for when an item of clothing is ahead of, of, or after its time.

Indecent                                             10 years before its time

Shameless                                           5 years before its time

Daring                                                1 year before its time

Smart

Dowdy                                               1 year after its time

Hideous                                              10 years after its time

Ridiculous                                          20 years after its time

Amusing                                             30 years after its time

Quaint                                                50 years after its time

Charming                                           70 years after its time

Romantic                                            100 years after its time

Beautiful                                            150 years after its time.

Blumer (1969) approached fashion as an expression of the present. In interviews with designers intended to identify the stimuli that they felt influenced their creations, they mentioned trying to ‘feel’ what was current within art, literature, and public debate. World events left their trace in fashion. It has to express what happened at the time, it must be a ‘Zeitgeist.’

3.4 System Theories

Davis (1992) differentiates between two types of sociological model used to explain the dissemination of clothing styles. The first, the populist model, centers on the consumer’s role and the laymen’s innovations in dress. Researchers who use the populist model study general consumption, for example, how groups such as teenagers, surfers, gays, skateboarders, or feminists set their own stamp on fashion. The other model is a system model. Some system models are predicated on the existence of established social centers for innovation, for example Paris or Milan, with their fashion shows, designers, editors, wholesalers, stylists, and so on. The fashion system is here seen as a closed circle of producers, distributors, and consumers.

Trickle-down theory has been criticized by system theorists because it does not focus on the complex structures of organizations and marketing that channel and mediate the fashion process. Those who use a system model aim to analyze the influence of the different elements of the fashion system. One subject of controversy has been whether designers are creative interpreters or merely passive intermediaries in the commercially vital process of heeding consumers’ wishes and reconciling them with the producers’ requirements.

3.5 Fashion As A Break With Convention

The destruction of what exists and the construction of something new in the process are the elements that unite in fashion, according to Simmel. Researchers who today see fashion as breaking current rules usually identify groups other than the socioeconomic upper class as leading fashion. Campbell (1992) has criticized the class differentiation theorist’s explanations and identifies different types of ‘new’: the new, the innovative, and the novel. The novel—new as different—is central to fashion as it breaks with what already exists. The necessary conditions for creating novelty exist in peripheral groups such as bohemians and artists. It is these groups who set fashion in motion, not an upper class. To argue that fashion is unconventional, however, is also to argue that fashion continuously reestablishes social conventions and social order. Blumer (1969) sees both similarities and differences between fashion and custom. In both cases it is a question of social ordering. Custom, however, is static or changes only slowly, while fashion is a constant creator of social order. In Blumer’s argument, every fashion emerges from an intensive process of ‘collective selection.’ The alternatives that are ultimately selected become fashion in different areas. Fashion conjures order out of the vast jumble of possible styles where no objective norm can determine ‘right’ or ‘wrong.’

3.6 Fashion As A Psychological And Social Expression

Psychologically oriented theories of fashion frequently center on general human needs such as the wish to be appreciated. It is often pointed out that people’s need to display and strengthen their ego is particularly strong. Fashion has great shock value in the hunt for self-expression; it provides a tangible ‘look at me.’

In a discussion of fashion as an expression of personality we can return to Simmel. Fashion makes it possible to express opposites. While conveying personality (paradoxically in the extreme imitation of the modern), it also offers the chance to a oid conveying individuality, and thus functions as the ego’s ‘iron mask.’

Fashion offers a means of psychological expression, but also a social expression of protest. People express in fashion the impulses and wishes that are not sanctioned by normal social conventions. There is thus a constant tension between the more established ‘domain of culture’ and the marginal ‘domain of fashion.’ In fashion, young people express their stance through wearing what Konig (1973) calls a ‘Gegenuniform.’

The idea of fashion as a vehicle of social protest has been criticized, however. Protest styles are usually incorporated into fashion and exploited economically (Emberley 1987). Others argue that fashion’s break with convention is actually a pseudodeviation. Although certainly defying convention, each break loses its original edge as soon as it is expressed in fashion (Wilson 1985).

Fashion has been interpreted as an expression of the search for a personal identity in an insecure world, and ‘fads and fashions’ as an expression of the worry that typifies our time. This has sometimes been interpreted as a negative phenomenon. Blumer (1969) thinks that the operation of fashion becomes natural in a changing world where people must continuously cut their ties with the past. Individuals are liberated from earlier models, and orient themselves towards the future.

4. Fashion’s Cycles

Some researchers have been less interested in fashion’s social dynamic than in an in-depth descriptive study of its cycles. Richardson and Kroeber (1940) use empirical data to identify six different formal aspects in women’s dress taking, for example, the changes in length and width of skirts over 300 years. A number of researchers have followed Kroeber’s empirical tradition, in which specific changes in fashion are seen to occur within a continuous cycle of longer periods. For example, Robinson studied beard fashions between 1842 and 1972 as time series analyses. To understand the elapse between the reappearance of the same fashion, Robinson argues that certain ground rules apply for fashion’s cyclical changes, one being that as long as a number of people still follow a certain fashion, it prevents younger people from adopting it.

Fashion in this perspective is not born, but is rediscovered. Cross-cyclical changes receive particular attention as demonstrating sharp reactions to extreme styles. For example, the streamlined form’s soft curves are contrasted with the ensuing period’s particularly angular design.

5. Ambivalence Towards Fashion: The Vitally Unimportant

Fashion’s symbolic significance has been contrasted with its lack of practicality. This has led many today to express ambivalence towards fashion, and there is a tendency to legitimize it using functional arguments; the rational and practical is acceptable where the impractical is not. Function and symbolism can sometimes be reconciled in fashion, however. Aerodynamics has been described as a discovery of great significance for industrial design, and for a time all household appliances were streamlined. ‘Streamlining’ symbolized America’s enlightened practice of throwing over old conventions to create a new and dynamic civilization. Those who chose, for example, a streamlined kettle, demonstrated that they also chose the rational, the future, the practical.

6. Fashion As Unpredictable

Increasingly, fashion’s analysts have come to emphasize the inner dynamic in fashion. Individual theories are run together to reflect fashion’s inherent contradictions: it is coercion and individual choice; it is social order and a break with social order; it is union and differentiation. The nature of fashion is seen as ever more complex.

There is a more simplistic perspective, however, common to those who base their interpretation of fashion on industrial products. Here one finds phrases such as ‘the most thorough logic of planned aging,’ and ‘industry is based on extolling a perpetual neology.’ Fashion, however, is to be found everywhere, not only in areas that are subject to commercial planning, while the aging of fashion is impossible to predict precisely, however much industry demands precise guidelines. The problems stem from fashion’s most central characteristic: because it symbolizes ‘now,’ it can never be foreseen with any certainty. Fashion pinpoints what is right in the present, but the moment it can be predicted accurately, it is no longer a matter of fashion. The transient symbols of what is right for now can never be nailed down in advance.

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