From Collective Selection to Individual Style: A Symbolic Transfer in Fashion

Abstract

The paper aims to uncover the reasons why fashion appearsin terms of collective selection in a movement towards individualstyle in the way people dress. Here, fashion is viewedin terms of collective fashion trends and personal style. Thus,it is the clothes, dressing habits, and garments that are observedin the research. The paper shows how the theory ofsymbolic interactionism can be used as an analytical tool tobring transparency to the movement from collective selectiontowards individual style in the fashion industry. This theoreticalapproach, which is connected to social interaction helps avoidthe classical research trap of making statements through thestudy of cause and effect. The analysis is made based on examplesof meanings created around the garment through an observationof the process from the initial meaning the persongives to as a symbol in social interaction, to the final stagewhen it becomes an individual style. There are four such phasesthat together create the final picture of why fashion isheading towards individual style. All these phases have differentsources, and naturally provide different answers to the initialresearch question in this paper. Once the garment is turnedinto an individual style and, as customers seek more details ingarments, there then occur a collapse of the “total look” towardshyper individuality. 1. The same garment may have different meanings for usdepending on social interaction and symbol. When observingthe same garments around the globe, they appear to have acommon reality but this is not the case as these garmentshave different meanings. This reality is depicted in earlierstudies such as Sapir (1999) that concludes that the main difficultyin understanding fashion and its apparent extravagances isthe lack of exact knowledge of the unconscious symbolism offorms, colours, materials, postures and other elements that expressa given culture. This difficulty is exacerbated by the factthat some expressive elements tend to have different symbolicreferences in different contexts. It is interesting to näote thatcurrent studies in fashion are in contradiction with such logic. 2. The same garment may have the same meaning dependingon social interaction and symbol. When the same garmenthas the same meaning, such as a police uniform, it is straight-forward in communicating belongings, simply because the garment can be understood in exactly the same way by bothparties. Lönnqvist (2008) is outspoken about power games inapparel communication with the assistance of garments. It is amatter of how one dresses and turns oneself out with differentversions of clothing - from the warrior's fearsome armour tothe sexy and suggestive underwear. Power can be manifestedin different ways, and clothing is among its more visibleindicators. Clothes can radiate dominance and dignity, but alsoa sense of ridicule and humiliation thereby destroying their initialpurpose of meaning. The question that arises then is, whencan those garments become fashion if by definition the latteris a matter of a desire to keep up with times and to expressthe tastes that are emerging in a changing world?3. Different garments may have different meanings dependingon social interaction and symbol. A communication problemarises when different garments have different meanings infashion. This problem highlights the structure of fashion designas well as pricing in the world. There is perhaps no otherbusiness sector like fashion, in terms of the correlation betweena certain design and garments with price. The price criterioncuts across market criteria in the structural segmentationof the fashion industry. According to Saviolo and Testa,(2002) there are five price categories: couture, ready-to-wear,diffusion, bridge, and mass. A garment designed on the upperlevel in terms of price might differ radically from the designof a garment on the mass production level. 4. Different garments may have the same meaning dependingon social interaction and symbol. When different garmentshave the same meaning in terms of status, income levels, gender,etc. department stores and “shops-in-shop” are frequentlyused together with branding to introduce these different garmentswith the same meaning to target groups on the market. Department stores are consequently the appropriate venues createdto enable the introduction of these particular garments anddeal with the particular situation they engender. Miller (1981)studied such a case in detail, focusing on Le Bon Marché inParis. The latter refers to a large fashion department store andits place in fashion history. By allowing interactions with thesociety in which it is situated, and reflecting the changes thatoccur in that society, the department store becomes the livingmirror of that society. The department store thus achieves acommunicative role by using the living environment as a legitimizingjustification of their very existence. As such, the departmentstore as a display of fashion and witness of its historicalchange, typifies symbolic interactionism at work. This conceptual banter anchored in a symbolic interactionismframework that underlies this study has revealed four significantaspects that arise out of the movement from collectiveselection towards individual style in fashion:1) When the same garment can have different meanings, itcan create individualities depending on time, place and the roleof the designer. 2) When the same garment has the samemeaning as in the case of uniforms, then it can be used as amanifest for power. In certain circumstances these garmentscan move from being a symbol of power to become a symbolto communicate fashion indicating changes in the society aswhole. 3) When different garments have different meanings,the price practice becomes a communication tool towards theconsumers. The subsequent brand extension habits of fashionfirms through stretching, collaborating, etc. confuses consumerswho responsively become more individualistic in their choiceof garments including mixing brands. This situation sometimesgenerates a hyper personalized fashion. 4) Where different garmentshave the same meanings to the consumers, the place orthe store achieves a significant role in the marketing communicationof fashion.