Fashion, Postmodernity and Personal Appearance

A Symbolic Interactionist Formulation

Bibliographic Data

ID2481027
AuthorsSusan B Kaiser (0000-0002-6031-5157, University of California, Davis, corresponding author), Richard H Nagasawa (Arizona State University), Sandra S Hutton (Colorado State University)
Year1991
Volume14
Issue2
Pages165-185
Publication date1991-06-01
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueSymbolic Interaction (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0195-6086 • E-ISSN: 1533-8665
PublisherWiley (PUBLISHER • GB)
DOI10.1525/si.1991.14.2.165
OpenAlexW1986210580
LanguageEN
Citations received34
References cited25

A theoretical explanation of fashion change is offered, drawing upon symbolic-interactionist insights on fashion and appearance, and developing macro-micro connections between cultural ambivalence and the negotiation of meaning as inspired by symbolic ambiguity in appearances. The postmodern condition, connected with advanced capitalism, spawns cultural ambivalence and a plethora of clothing styles that emerge, in part, to clarify and lend expression to ambivalence. A broad variety of clothing styles, however, coupled with tendencies toward production of self, contribute to a high degree of ambiguity in individually constructed appearances, the meaning of which must then be collectively negotiated in social interaction. Failure of clothing styles to resolve cultural ambivalence results in fashion change in an ongoing dialectic

Aesthetics · Ambiguity · Ambivalence · Art · Clothing · Dialectic · Epistemology · Negotiation · Postmodernism · Postmodernity · Psychoanalysis · Social science · Sociology · Symbolic interactionism · The Symbolic · Computer Science · Crafts, Textile, and Design · Cultural Industries and Urban Development · Fashion and Cultural Textiles · Psychology · Social Psychology

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