To analyze fashion as a system, we must look for its systemic characteristics, the kinds of workers it involves and the tasks each worker does. Fashion is a system of institutions, organizations, groups, producers, events and practices, all of which contribute to the making of fashion, which is different from dress or clothing. It is the structural nature of the system that affects the legitimation process of designers\u2019 creativity. A systemic differentiation can be made between clothes and fashion which are two independent, autonomous entities. As noted earlier, fashion is a manufactured cultural symbol in an institutionalized system. Institutional factors in the social process of the making of a designer must also be examined. Although designers play an important role in the system, we should not neglect other fashion-related occupational groups in the system, such as journalists and publicists among many others. Strictly speaking, When I say that fashion is an ideology, I do not mean in a Marxist aesthetics sense, locating the works of the designers in the social and political environment. An ideology is a myth, and it may be defined as beliefs, attitudes and opinions all of which can be tightly or loosely related. Ideology constitutes any set of beliefs, and whether they are true or false is not relevant for it to exist. All beliefs are socially determined in some way or another although there is no assumption that any one factor is more important or more true.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Fashion as a myth has no scientific and concrete substance. The function of myth is essentially cognitive, namely to account for the fundamental conceptual categories of the mind. It embodies collective experiences and represents the collective conscience, and this is how the myth continues. While traditional anthropology was concerned with the study of myths in primitive society, the structural analysis of myth has also been applied to modern industrial societies. For instance, Barthes (1964) treats myths as a system of communications, consisting not only of written discourses, but also the products of cinema, sport, photography, advertising and television. Likewise, social institutions and practices construct the fashion myth.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Understanding fashion as a system helps us demystify the belief in fashion and also analyze \u2018the mysterious dictates of the fashion capital Paris\u2019 (Flugel 1930: 147). Flugel remarks: Fashion, we have been brought up to believe (and generations of writers in the myriad of journals have contributed to this belief), is a mysterious goddess, whose decrees it is our duty to obey rather than to understand; for indeed, it is implied, these decrees transcend all ordinary human understanding. We know not why they are made, or how long they will endure, but only that they must be followed; and that the quicker the obedience the greater is the merit. (1930: 137)<\/p>\n\n\n\n
It was always the French kings, queens and aristocrats who initiated fashion trends which subsequently trickled down to the masses and spread to other parts of Europe. Latest fashions were found in Paris, and foreigners and Parisians make pilgrimages to the source of Paris fashions (Steele 1988: 27).<\/p>\n\n\n\n
A fashion-ological approach to fashion can also provide the answer to the fickleness of fashion. Laver explained fashion\u2019s irrationality and superficial tendencies as follows: \u2018pleasures of vicissitude\u2019 adds to the enjoyment of life. Fads, crazes, fashion moods and fashion follies within the fashion of the day bring short lived amusement. People who always do the same things and wear the same clothes, are themselves bored and make them boring for others. Every fashion is in existence for a certain period of time and nobody knows exactly when or why its popularity suddenly arises and then almost as quickly as it came, fades away. (1950: 66)<\/p>\n\n\n\n
An empirical study on fashion as a system shows the distinction between clothing and fashion and that fashion is not created in a vacuum. The differences between the two can be clearly drawn as follows (Kawamura 2004: 1): Clothing is material production while fashion is symbolic production. Clothing is tangible while fashion is intangible. Clothing is a necessity while fashion is an excess. Clothing has a utility function while fashion has a status function. Clothing is found in any society or culture where people clothe themselves while fashion must be institutionally constructed and culturally diffused. A fashion system operates to convert clothing into fashion that has a symbolic value and is manifested through clothing.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
In explaining the labeling process of deviance, Becker (1982) says that social definitions create reality, and therefore, sociologists need to ask, in the same manner, who is entitled to label things as fashion or fashionable. We need only observe which members of the fashion system are treated as capable of doing that. Some occupy institutional positions which allow them to decide what will be acceptable and fashionable. As far as French fashion is concerned, it is the members of the trade organization.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Based on White and White\u2019s study (1993[1965]) on the French Impressionists and Becker\u2019s analysis of the art world (1982), fashion can be examined as a system composed of various institutions. These institutions together reproduce the image of fashion and perpetuate the culture of fashion in major fashion cities, such as Paris, New York, London and Milan. My empirical study (Kawamira 2004) of French fashion indicates that fashion as a system first emerged in Paris in 1868 with the institutionalization of exclusive custom-made clothes known as Haute Couture.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The system consists of a number of subsystems comprised of a network of designers, manufacturers, wholesalers, public relations officers, journalists and advertising agencies. The fashion industry is not simply concerned with the production of adequate or pleasant clothing but is concerned with the production of new stylistic innovations that satisfy the image of fashion. Similarly, in the case of the art world, it consists of artists, producers, museum directors, museum-goers, theater-goers, reporters for newspapers, critics for publications of all sorts, art historians, art theorists, philosophers of art among others, and they keep the machinery of the art world working and thereby provide for its continuing existence (Dickie quoted in Becker 1982: 150).<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Any item of clothing is capable of being appreciated and can be turned into fashion. Not every attempt to label something fashion may be successful, but there is nothing more to making something fashion than christening or legitimating it. It is the institutions of fashion that do that. The designers must be recognized by other participants in the cooperative activities through which their works are produced and consumed by others.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
To analyze fashion as a system, we must look for its systemic characteristics, the kinds of workers it involves and the tasks each worker does. Fashion is a system of institutions, organizations, groups, producers, events and practices, all of which contribute to the making of fashion, which is different from dress or clothing. It is … <\/p>\n