Fashion as a Culture and Identity Expression Tool - Essay Example

Fashion as a Culture and Identity Expression Tool Introduction The world is made of people from different social, economic and cultural backgrounds that interact at different levels but seek to retain their cultural identities. However, the emerging impacts of globalization have affected the approaches used to express identity except the use of fashion. Through fashion, different individuals from different parts of the world are given a chance to express their culture through their dressing choices. This is especially important in situations where people migrate from their countries to foreign countries for educational or economic reasons (English, 2007). Travelling and interacting with the outside world exposes individuals to the multicultural nature of the world and the way different people in the globe dress. Through fashion, a Vietnamese is presented with an opportunity to represent his culture through construct and expressive identities in bigger cities across the world where they mingle with strangers. Through fashion, expressive statement about one’s individual culture and identities is enhanced as the accessories and nature of the clothing can only be directly associated with their clothing type. In this essay, the impacts of traditional and cultural wear in representing the identity and culture of a given group of people will be discussed (Bennett, 2005). One example of a traditional wear that has been used to represent identities and make expressive statements about identities is the Indian women swear. Indian women have specific traditional wears such as the sari that is known and associated with the Indian women across the globe. This fashion has enabled the Indian women to make expressive statements about their individual identities and personality. Fashion, communication and culture The development of the world fashion can be described as a contemporary and cosmopolitan fashion that is exposed to the dynamics of changes blended by the different cultures. As a result, different new dresses and fashions are created daily and these include the use of the trench coats and other contemporary dressing which are seen to reflect the identity of the western culture. However, changes to the fashion adopted across the world were influenced by a number of factors, including but not limited to climatic and interaction with foreigners (English, 2007). Despite the incursion of the Indians into the east African protectorate during the colonial era, the time did not produce significant impacts into their dressing as the people lacked a discrete outwear among the women. This is not the same situation for an Indian woman who moves to the United Kingdom, a country with episodes of extreme weather conditions. This environment affects the nature of dressing of the Indian women and makes the use of fashion as expressive and cultural identities tools essential. To adjust to the local weather in Britain, it is common to witness Indian women acquire contemporary dressings in the country to enable them survive the cold weather (Entwistle, 2000). Fashion and clothing are two different yet related concepts just like sex and gender where one has biological construct while the other has a culturally constructed meaning. As a result, the dynamism of the fashions for the two genders differs significantly with that of men changing with season and the trend in the global (English, 2007). As opposed to women’s fashion that is used for aesthetic purposes, men’s wear have a more practicality appeal which is meant to enable them accomplish their different roles as providers in families. Fashion in women is however used to embrace the functionality and practicality of their duties but is mostly designed to demonstrate the beauties in them. This makes it possible to agree with the statement that fashion and clothing has been used to develop a process of socialization for the sexual and gender roles (Kaiser, 2012). Through fashion, the men and women’s image is also developed and this makes it possible to determine whether it is possible to determine what is acceptable or not within a given culture. Before the development of contemporary fashion for men, men were regarded as being irresponsive to fashion and demonstrating a strong desire to express identity through fashion was considered unnatural. This was not the same with women as the society venerated those who loved the masculine dressing and were considered as power fashion and dressers (Entwistle, 2000). However, music and bands have affected the previously held position on the men’s dressing and has resulted into the use of different dressing approaches in men to express identity, belief and culture. The new romantic subcultures introduced new dressing codes for men that fused the women and men dressing fashions into a unisexual dressing code that they used to express their culture. This led to the rise of men’s interest in using make up like nail polish and other skin adjustments to show their sexual identities and cultural beliefs. Andrej Pejic, a famous male fashion star has used fashion to express his identity and sexual orientation and this has made it possible for different people to make judgment of his belief, cultural orientation and other personal beliefs about him based on the dressing (Barnard, 2007). Fashion and visual expression In one of the photos commonly used to demonstrate the strength of fashion to depict the culture and identity of individuals, Andrej is shown to dress in a fitting printed jacket with half naked pants lying seductively on a couch. From a first glance, one can deduce that Andrej is a woman showing her sexual appeal but on scrutiny, it becomes obvious that he is a male with a female fashion appeal to demonstrate his homosexual orientation. Therefore, fashion provides a clear and discrete avenue for determining the sex, gender and sexual orientation of individuals based on first judgments that an individual can be able to form. This communication is passed easily by the wearer through going against the conventional norm of dressing in men or even in women as has been demonstrated by Andrej (Taylor, 2002). The society has culturally contrasted a specific dressing approach for both men and women and those who conform to this convention rarely have much to demonstrate about their identities. However, this changes if one subverts the conventional dressing approach and adopts one that is against the grain in an effort to pass information concerning their sexuality, identity and gender (Edwards, 2011). The description of identity and fashion must make a critical description of race, ethnicity and nationality as these three affects the thinking of man and their ability to conform to a particular thinking like fashion. Therefore, human beings have the trait of liking and forming an attraction towards people who behave and do different things like them. The changes in the economic and political environments in the world has led to mass migration of people across the world in pursuit of educational, economic and social empowerment (Kaiser, 2012). This has created a situation where cultural identities are threatened leaving fashion as the only avenue through which different people can express their social background and attract friends with similar backgrounds or those that understands them. The different cultures and religions across the world have formed conventional dressing rules for both men and women and this has been perpetuated and made to grow further through fashion. This has led to the introduction of the ethnic dresses, which are mostly worn and identifiable with one ethnic group using the ensembles, and the different modifications made. Traditional fashions and dressings have resisted any forces of change and this has enabled them to remain relatively similar for example the Indian women dressing which has remained static despite the changes in weather conditions and towns (Taylor, 2002). In some countries, national dresses are designed and these are used to represent the identities, loyalty and culture of these countries in other foreign countries. The development of the national dress was considered as a socio-political concept of nations that has been used to help in boundary demarcation and control. The development of national dresses in most countries has borrowed from the ethnic dressing codes of tribes within the country who are found to dominate the cosmopolitan towns. This is common in countries that are multi-ethnic based with a dominant tribe, which has strong cultural identities, and fashion that can be adopted in the country (Steele, 2001). For example, the adoption of the sari in India as the women dress borrows heavily from the Muslim religious identity of the burka. Certain Muslim cast have used the saris as their identical dress in woman and this increased the dominance of the dress in India, making it a favourable women dress in the country. According to the Muslim religious teachings, women are supposed to cover the whole of their bodies while out in the social world where they interact with different people. However, the Muslim radical nature has made the use of dress as an expressive way of acknowledging the social and religious identities as a compulsory life and death situation (Barnard, 2007). As a result, a number of youths especially those in the public universities who have been exposed to the dynamism of the world have been exposed to torture and even public prosecution for their dressings which are not in conformity with the religion. The use of dress for the expression of the religious beliefs and doctrines have affected the youths who have also adopted a universal dressing code and fashion to express their inner feelings and beliefs. This is common in Iraq where religious groups and radical Shia Muslims have ordered for the execution of Muslim youths perceived to adopt foreign dressing cultures, disregarding the impacts of fashion to represent age and identity as a youth (Bennett, 2005). Discussions on fashion as a way of expressing culture and identity cannot fail to mention the place of youths, who have developed various approaches to depict their beliefs and personal identities. The youths in the contemporary world have more disposable income as compared to their counterparts who lived in the early years of the last century. This makes it possible for the youths to delve into fashion and use it as an approach to express their social, cultural and gender identities to the world. Different subcultures have emerged that have influenced the use of fashion as a means of expression in youths, including the Teddy boys and the Punks subcultures (Barker, 2000). These subcultures have been used to express the collective identities shared by youths across the world, separated by geographical location but sharing in their idea and approach to fashion. The punks used their dressing approaches, which were considered as anti-fashion to express their feeling towards the socio-economic and political changes that were being witnessed in the United Kingdom. The group used items from different spheres of life to form part of their fashion and this led to the communication of a new meaning, one which differed from the contemporary fashion approaches in the country in the 70s (Barker, 2000). By using their weird approaches to dressing, the punks communicated their feelings towards the uncontrolled lack of employment in the country, the skyrocketing lack of poverty levels and the changing moral standings of the country. The fashion incorporated a number of approaches that were viewed as being ant-fashion by this time and these included the use of chains, bold colour dyes, iconography as a way of depicting their sexual fetishism and hatred to the social structure of the country. This group therefore extended the use of fashion and adopted an approach of demonstrating their anger and frustration and that felt by other youths through the use of fashion. The group also adopted a number of rituals including body piercing and tattoos to create a permanent visual illustration of their culture and make their ideologies grow stronger in the United Kingdom (Barker, 2000). Western influence and the interaction with cultures have however affected the consistencies in dressing especially among Indian women who migrate to British. In their childhood, the women find it easy to illustrate and communicate their culture using dress but these changes as they grow and become professionals who must follow a specific dressing code and abandon the saris. Though this does not affect their love for their traditional dresses and their expressive power, it affects their recognition as Indian women (Gibson, 2006). Conclusion The essence of fashion and the use of dressing and the dress codes to represent different fashions have grown in prominence and this has seen different countries, groups and religious formation forming individual fashion codes. Using fashion as an expressive tool, different groups and individuals have continued to represent their beliefs through dressing as was demonstrated by Andrej, a fashion model with a homosexual orientation, one that he has continued to illustrate using his dressing code. This essay have offered deconstructed meaning to fashion and its use as a way of showing identity and the adaptation to different economic, social and cultural environments (Gibson, 2006). Using fashion, the paper has demonstrated that people are empowered to demonstrate their class, gender and sexual orientation, religious belief and even nationality. This explains the emergence of national dress code like the saris in India that is used by women to respect the Muslim dressing code that restricts provocative and revealing dressings in women. As humans, we possess a strong feeling and desire to express our feelings, ideologies and belief and fashion offers the best option to do so freely. References Barker, C. (2000). ‘Youth, style and resistance’, in, C. Barker, Cultural Studies: Theory and Practice London: Sage. Barnard, M. (2007). Fashion Theory: A Reader London: Routledge. Bennett, A. (2005). Fashion, in, Culture and Everyday Life London: Sage. Edwards, T. (2011). Fashion in Focus: Concepts, Practices and Politics. London: Routledge. English, B. (2007). A Cultural History of Fashion in the 20th Century Oxford: Berg. Entwistle, J. (2000). The Fashioned Body: Fashion, Dress and Modern Social Theory Cambridge: Polity. Gibson, P. (2006). Analysing Fashion, in, T. Jackson, D. Shaw (eds). The Fashion Handbook London: Routledge. Kaiser, S. B. (2012). Fashion and Cultural Studies. Oxford: Berg. Taylor, L. (2002). The Study of Dress History Manchester: Manchester University Press. Steele, V. (2001). The Corset: A Cultural History New Haven and London: Yale University Press . Read More