ABSTRACT
From its beginnings in the fifteenth century, intensified interest in fashion and the study of fashion over the last thirty years has led to a vast and varied literature on the subject.
This collection of essays surveys and contextualizes the ways in which a wide range of disciplines have used a variety of theoretical approaches to explain, and sometimes to explain away, the astonishing variety, complexity and beauty of fashion. Themes covered include individual, social and gender identity, the erotic, consumption and communication.
By collecting together some of the most influential and important writers on fashion and exposing the ideas and theories behind what they say, this unique collection of extracts and essays brings to light the presuppositions involved in the things we think and say about fashion.
TABLE OF CONTENTS
part One|4 pages
Fashion and fashion theories
part Two|5 pages
Fashion and history/fashion in history
part Three|4 pages
What fashion is and is not
part Four|4 pages
What fashion and clothing do
part Five|5 pages
Fashion as communication
chapter 14|11 pages
When The Meaning is Not A Message
part Six|8 pages
Fashion
part Seven|4 pages
Fashion, clothes and the body
part Eight|5 pages
Production and consumption
part Nine|4 pages
Modern fashion
part Ten|4 pages
Post-modern fashion
chapter 39|21 pages
Deconstruction Fashion
part Eleven|5 pages
Fashion and (the) image
chapter 41|7 pages
Fashion Photography
part Twelve|5 pages
Fashion, fetish and the erotic