Approaches to fashion

[Chant]

I think its a joke people drop 20k a semester to study fashion.

Universities are free here.
And there are even some places where you get pay to study for four years, and where BSR could improve his skills, not only in playing GTA.

[Chant]

It's not that fashion and clothes aren't interesting objects for philosophers and other social scientists. Indeed, what is a piece of clothing? is it a sign? a sign of what? of the self? of social conventions? of utility? is it a form? what is the meaning of the shapes? what are the connections between the body and clothing? constriction? embellishment? why? etc etc are obviously very relevant issues for these disciplines.

So... it's more that these people (academics) don't have any interest in garments. They find it shallow and despicable. And they generally dress very poorly! Why? This is a good question, not so much about fashion and clothing, but about these people and their way of life. The contempt for the body, and the underlying stupid dualism is the explanation i would favor as of now.

The causes why fashion is not considered as a serious subject can be precisely traced back in my opinion.
In the Latin rhetoric, res (thoughts) are opposed to verba (words), and ideas are of course more important than words. Cicero uses an interesting metapher to describe the relation between res and verba : he writes that the words are the garment of the ideas, i.e they're 1°) superficial, 2°) incidental, 3°) superfluous. Another sentence, that will have a great success, especially with Augustinus, says that thoughts are like "the soul in the body" (De Oratore, XIV, 44). Given that most academics are living in a world of ideas and that the academic disciplines do not question, apart from a few exceptions, the spirit/soul dichotomy, you have a clear explanation why fashion can not be a serious object for their researches.

Would be interesting to see which are the fields the Szians academics are working in - and see if there's a conection between their researches and their interest for fashion. In a new thread called "Your body, your researches".

[cowsareforeating]

but they do not go about their lives naked. in fact, they seem to invest at a minimum as much thought into their mode dress as the sorts they aim to distance themselves from. whatever the outcome, rarely is something not deliberate with respect to the incidental and superfluous. and even with the things that do not seem consciously belaboured and dissected into the ground with each choice, there are still many fascinating questions on what these choices are prompted by. especially the most reflexive ones.

Don't they do what is required to be taken seriously in their field? Which is simply a shifted normative that shows disdain for the human body (maybe the age old idea that it is simply a container for the brain/soul?).

Being naked would be outside that accepted norm no?

If I were to even generalize further, a majority of academics do very little to keep their physical condition in check -- or one could argue that they aren't outside the influence of our broken food systems. Either way, very little effort is put towards conventional "attractive or well groomed" and THAT we can agree on? So why the origination of this norm?

[Fuuma]

Immense facepalm at this.
Heidegger is 100% useless and probably the most overestimated philosopher of the century. And Barthes is a nice critic, and is ok for Sunday afternoon, but isn't very innovative. And he wrote many crap articles and books.

Well, I agree with you only if you equate 'important to the XXth century' to the sum of (bullshit) papers one has devoted to an author between 1900 and 1999.

Oh please, what is important is not the specific authors I named and how you evaluate their contribution but the point I was making about certain fields. Replace them with your two favourites, Soral and Onfray if you like.

[BSR]

Oh please, what is important is not the specific authors I named and how you evaluate their contribution but the point I was making about certain fields. Replace them with your two favourites, Soral and Onfray if you like.

i can't imagine someone seriously comparing the respective merits of such broad 'fields' as you say, as philosophy, literature, cinema, music, etc. It's ridiculous. Sounds like children discussin the galaxies' sizes or the power of their comics' heroes, or SZers comparing Rick and Carol. The only question that matters is who is important in each of these fields, and what does it mean to be 'important'.

[cowsareforeating]

was a hyperbole, though i think there is a good deal of chewier bits when you start getting into the normative, shifted or otherwise.. thats sort of what i was going for.

(i'd like to summon docus into this discussion, time/effort permitting..)

The two easiest sources is disdain (on the so-called intellectuals side) for materialism or appearance being incorrectly equated with superficiality..

And the other being a masculine society condemning a "female" pursuit. Those are starting points no?

[Faust]

I don't know how much traction the latter would gain outside of the female circle of critics, such as Robin Givhan, in 2013, but I would be very much interested to hear some opinions.

Perhaps a better way to phrase it would be a "feminine/effeminate pursuit," then the stereotype that fashion is for women and gay men can be included, which I think is more accurate.

[Fuuma]

i can't imagine someone seriously comparing the respective merits of such broad 'fields' as you say, as philosophy, literature, cinema, music, etc. It's ridiculous. Sounds like children discussin the galaxies' sizes or the power of their comics' heroes, or SZers comparing Rick and Carol. The only question that matters is who is important in each of these fields, and what does it mean to be 'important'.

Here comes Malet&Isaac.

[BSR]

Here comes Malet&Isaac.

you're malet obviously

[525252]

The causes why fashion is not considered as a serious subject can be precisely traced back in my opinion.
In the Latin rhetoric, res (thoughts) are opposed to verba (words), and ideas are of course more important than words. Cicero uses an interesting metapher to describe the relation between res and verba : he writes that the words are the garment of the ideas, i.e they're 1°) superficial, 2°) incidental, 3°) superfluous. Another sentence, that will have a great success, especially with Augustinus, says that thoughts are like "the soul in the body" (De Oratorio, XIV, 44). Given that most academics are living in a world of ideas and that the academic disciplines do not question, apart from a few exceptions, the spirit/soul dichotomy, you have a clear explanation why fashion can not be a serious object for their researches.

Thanks for that, this is why i love sz <3<3<3

BSR enjoys Disney cartoons and Grand Theft Auto. Because obviously there is nothing in between that and Heidegger.

Hey man, I'm genuinely curious as to what he enjoys, in my whole time here, my general impression of BSR is of someone who puts things down and doesn't seem to like or care about whatever topic. Maybe I'm never in the right threads but my idea of him is that he is very cynical.

I definitely don't have an all or nothing approach to academic texts either and yet it seems accusations fly through regardless...
Can we please stop this ridiculous finger pointing and bickering about meanness? I don't care if someone does or doesn't understand Heidegger, they may as well be a child if they're acting like one.

[shah]

i can't imagine someone seriously comparing the respective merits of such broad 'fields' as you say, as philosophy, literature, cinema, music, etc. It's ridiculous. Sounds like children discussin the galaxies' sizes or the power of their comics' heroes, or SZers comparing Rick and Carol. The only question that matters is who is important in each of these fields, and what does it mean to be 'important'.

does this mean one cannot claim that, for example, chemistry is superior to alchemy because both may have contributors important in their respective, isolated fields ? i don't think i can buy that (if is what you're saying)

Cicero uses an interesting metapher to describe the relation between res and verba : he writes that the words are the garment of the ideas, i.e they're 1°) superficial, 2°) incidental, 3°) superfluous.

i should probably read to rid myself of ignorance, but on the surface this sounds like fluff. what is an idea if it cannot be verbalized (or explained in some way) ? sounds like confusion and vagueries ...

difficult to realize there is bias in everything.

great point, i mean outside of the context of forum dynamics etc. this is something i think everyone struggles with and something that cannot be eliminated beyond a certain reasonable extent.

[docus]

It's very sad to see people's reactions to one another of late. There's clearly some history behind merz and Faust's relationship which I don't know, but unilateral threats of the kind on display don't reflect well on the site as a purported forum for intelligent, open-minded, thought-provoking debate.

Moreover, I think it goes without saying (but I will say it anyway) that merz makes very thoughtful contributions to the site and that it would lose some of its wit, bite and weight without him. He's the pepper in this cheese and pickle sandwich we call SZ.

Let's try to keep things in perspective - we're all here to discuss FASHION, which is a world where people tend to be... how to put it politely... rather thin-skinned (apart from me, obviously )... so we shouldn't be surprised when over-sensitive reactions and counter-reactions erupt and whip us all into histrionic frenzies...

Viewed in the cold light of day, are we not all narcissistic fools, investing our energy, time, intellect and money into absurdly overpriced clothes while the world around us collapses...? We're better off together as a support group for dealing with this accursed narcissistic affliction we all suffer from, not at war with one another... (The real war rages within us all...)

At the risk of sounding sanctimonious, perhaps we could all make an effort to accept one other's absurdity with a little more grace and humility?

[Faust]

And with these wise words from docus I shall remove that part of the thread and we can get back on topic.

[Fuuma]

you're malet obviously

I hear the arrival of a very progressive government with ambitious railway transportation projects marked the end of the prevalence of M&I books in secondary schools.

[laika]

are we not all narcissistic fools, investing our energy, time, intellect and money into absurdly overpriced clothes while the world around us collapses...?

Heh. I was coming here to say "hot air masturbation," because Christian, despite his academic inclinations , is shockingly prescient, but this is good stuff.

I would not preface "fools" with narcissistic--
I think there is something else outside, always elusive, that compels us in *fashion--but this absurd, nonsensical, irrational, excessive contradiction that you point out, that effects so many beyond the provincial boundaries of SZ (it's worth pointing out that the people in that collapsing world around us are making irrational investments too)....

this is exactly why fashion is so fascinating and so important. The co-existence of need and abundance--of survival and multiplicity--is one of the most urgently persisting questions of our time (and by our time, I mean some hundreds of years). Fashion has always been inextricable from this question, although the precise nature of the relationship now is still unclear. But whether enacting, problematizing or expressing, it has come to occupy a commanding position that spans (at least) economics, social relations, and aesthetics.

This is why fashion demands our most rigorous thought and not just a pleasurably digestible sunday feature from nytimes.




*fashion as in fashion. Because Merz' lovely post about "clothing" and the subject/object relationship is of a slightly different register, that is difficult (but not impossible, i hope) to incorporate into the above.