ABSTRACT
Clothing styles can elicit different responses from different social groups' points to yet another distinguishing feature of the clothing code and the currents of fashion to which it is subject. Temporally, there is reason to be cautious about ascribing precise meanings to most clothing. This chapter that clothing styles and the fashions that influence them over time constitute something approximating a code. Ambiguity is rife in what could be considered the contemporary dress code of Western society and is becoming even more so. The chapter presents three other distinguishing features of the clothing-fashion code. First, it is heavily context-dependent; second, there is considerable variability in how its constituent symbols are understood and appreciated by different social strata and taste groupings; and third, it is much more given to “undercoding” than to precision and explicitness. Even more than the utterances produced in everyday face-to-face interaction, the clothing-fashion code is highly context-dependent.
