Trust Us, We’re You”
Aspirational Realness in the Digital Communication of Contemporary Fashion and Beauty Brands
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 12918512 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Rosie Findlay (0000-0001-8596-6880, University of the Arts London, corresponding author) |
| Year | 2019 |
| Publication date | 2019-08-01 |
| Peer Reviewed | Yes |
| Open Access | Yes |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | Communication Culture and Critique (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 1753-9137 • E-ISSN: 1753-9129 |
| Publisher | Oxford University Press (OUP) (PUBLISHER) |
| DOI | 10.1093/ccc/tcz028 |
| OpenAlex | W2969725895 |
| Language | EN |
| Citations received | 6 |
| References cited | 10 |
In recent years, a number of fashion and beauty brands have developed promotional content that circulates an aspirational quality imbued with unstudied “cool” around their product. Despite the appeal of this conceit to tropes of the everyday, authenticity, and belonging, it presents a superficially relatable ideal whilst exploiting digital media’s capacities to foster intimacy and promote a postfeminist subjectivity based on consumption. This article examines three brands that circulate “aspirational realness” around their product: Glossier, Reformation, and Maryam Nassir Zadeh. All remediate the conventions of prior fashion media to communicate discourses of neoliberal femininity to a media-savvy consumer. Aspirational realness is thus read as a means by which consumption is both encouraged and situated as a means of self-realization in the likeness of other aspirational “cool girls.”
Advertising · Aesthetics · Appeal · Art · Beauty · Business · Consumption (sociology · Epistemology · Femininity · Ideal (ethics · Perspective (graphical · Political science · Product (mathematics · Situated · Sociology · Subjectivity · Visual arts · Computer Science · Fashion and Cultural Textiles · Gender, Feminism, and Media · Media, Gender, and Advertising · Psychology · Gender Studies · Philosophy
| Unique citing works | 6 |
|---|---|
| Citations per year | 1 |
| Citation span | 2020 - 2025 (6) |
| Citation velocity | recent |
| Highly cited | No |
| Citation types | Neutral: 5 |