Fashion and Sociology in the United States

• In Event: 378 - Open Refereed Roundtable Session II
  In Refereed Roundtable: B. Table 03. Cultural Sociology II

Abstract

Fashion provides one of the most rich, yet under examined, areas of inquiry for sociologists. Until recently (see Aspers and Godart 2013) most of our knowledge of fashion is derivative of mid-19th century theorists, such as Thorstein Veblen and Georg Simmel. In the present essay I propose a theory of fashion that diverges from these classical sociologists by incorporating a range of sociological constructs from ideology to race, and gender. I propose that fashion functions as a racially, classed and gendered aesthetic ideology that structures preferences for sensory culture. It is my hope that this conceptual essay brings to light the importance of fashion in everyday life as well as its inherent sociological nature.


Works cited
Aspers, Patrik and Frédéric Godart. 2013. Sociology of Fashion: Order and Change. Annual Review of Sociology, 39: 171-192

Simmel, Georg. 1972. On Individuality and Social Forms. Edited by and with an introduction by Donald Levine, Chicago: University of Chicago Press.

Veblen. (1899) 1953. Theory of the Leisure Class: An Economic Study of Institutions. New York: New American Library.

Author

• Angela Nurse, Michigan State University