By Dr Edward Brell
Conjure up a caricature in your mind of Eve standing in front of a huge fig tree saying to Adam: "I have nothing to wear!" Now go to an average Western woman's wardrobe and it is likely one will find it bulging with things to wear. Yet she will lament "I have nothing to wear!" Amusingly, nothing much has changed.
This is because clothing stripped of its fashionable, chic, occasion-appropriate components is not what she has in mind when she is dressing-up. The utilitarian benefits of an apron made of fig leaves just won't do these days.
Not surprising, dressing-up encompasses primordial issues that go much deeper than mere fashion or utilitarian covering up for warmth, modesty, etc. and it goes beyond the female gender as well.
Who has not seen men in the middle of summer wearing suits and ties? Perhaps in this North Australian climate wearing suits and ties conform to their avatar of compliant men, or wishing to appear so, or are clueless followers, like lemmings down a cliff face. Neck-tie choking dressing-up, would be seen as mandatory for a job interview, regardless of the constriction of blood flow to one's brain to the point where one would prefer to faint rather than answer interview question. Not much utilitarian found here. Dressing-up for a court appearance, whether for sentencing or equity, expert witnessing or advocating, is the same.
It's as if the outer was to speak for the inner.
At least women have the good sense to bare more in this climate even if the power suit is the order of the day. Yet they still insist in wearing stiletto heels despite being-uncomfortable and risking back injury through postural nonfeasance as well as risking trips and falls. Let's not forget the girdle-type attire retaining what would otherwise spread like a badly misshapen sack of potatoes....all in the name of beauty, or so it would seem.
And Santa attire at Christmas in the Southern Hemisphere is the most idiotic of them all. One might presuppose that I might have exempted myself from such inane practice. But No! Every year I dutifully did my HO-HO's when the kids were small. There has got to be an ill-intention fairy that gets delight from seeing us in ridiculous garb, perhaps not unlike the fun I have, letting my dachshund chase the red laser spot around the room.
Fashion has generally been conceived as a form of hegemonic oppression, exerting an obligation to conform (Diana Crane). But dressing-up is so much more than societal conformance or the outworking of the fashion industry manipulations. Take the cross-dresser who is motivated quite strongly against societal expectations, dressing-up in opposite sex clothing. Take the role players in a Nurse/Police uniform acting out a bedroom nuptial scene. No-one sees them dressing-up but themselves.
The topic of dressing-up, oversimplified and marginalized as fashion, is a serious subject touching the inner-most avatars. Dressing-up is not receiving the scholarly treatise it deserves being sketchy in many respects by scholars, relegating dressing-up to trivial or peripheral significance (Herbert Blumer, The Sociological Quarterly).
Sales of Superman or Batman outfits will attest to the Proteus effect in children while the quality and popularity of computer virtual games signal a complete immersion into the character of the game. Virtual dressing-up, no less! Grown men shooting paint balls at each other don battle fatigues, dressing-up to enter into the spirit of the game.
As for hegemonic oppression? The fashion industry merely adapts to, and exploits, what is already a deep pre-existing need to look good as defined by peers, tempered by a personal sense of aesthetics, to achieve a measure of personal significance as well as peer acceptance.
If fashion were ever to succumb to economic oblivion, dressing-up is here to stay, in one form or another.
Conjure up a caricature in your mind of Eve standing in front of a huge fig tree saying to Adam: "I have nothing to wear!" Now go to an average Western woman's wardrobe and it is likely one will find it bulging with things to wear. Yet she will lament "I have nothing to wear!" Amusingly, nothing much has changed.
This is because clothing stripped of its fashionable, chic, occasion-appropriate components is not what she has in mind when she is dressing-up. The utilitarian benefits of an apron made of fig leaves just won't do these days.
Not surprising, dressing-up encompasses primordial issues that go much deeper than mere fashion or utilitarian covering up for warmth, modesty, etc. and it goes beyond the female gender as well.
Who has not seen men in the middle of summer wearing suits and ties? Perhaps in this North Australian climate wearing suits and ties conform to their avatar of compliant men, or wishing to appear so, or are clueless followers, like lemmings down a cliff face. Neck-tie choking dressing-up, would be seen as mandatory for a job interview, regardless of the constriction of blood flow to one's brain to the point where one would prefer to faint rather than answer interview question. Not much utilitarian found here. Dressing-up for a court appearance, whether for sentencing or equity, expert witnessing or advocating, is the same.
It's as if the outer was to speak for the inner.
At least women have the good sense to bare more in this climate even if the power suit is the order of the day. Yet they still insist in wearing stiletto heels despite being-uncomfortable and risking back injury through postural nonfeasance as well as risking trips and falls. Let's not forget the girdle-type attire retaining what would otherwise spread like a badly misshapen sack of potatoes....all in the name of beauty, or so it would seem.
And Santa attire at Christmas in the Southern Hemisphere is the most idiotic of them all. One might presuppose that I might have exempted myself from such inane practice. But No! Every year I dutifully did my HO-HO's when the kids were small. There has got to be an ill-intention fairy that gets delight from seeing us in ridiculous garb, perhaps not unlike the fun I have, letting my dachshund chase the red laser spot around the room.
Fashion has generally been conceived as a form of hegemonic oppression, exerting an obligation to conform (Diana Crane). But dressing-up is so much more than societal conformance or the outworking of the fashion industry manipulations. Take the cross-dresser who is motivated quite strongly against societal expectations, dressing-up in opposite sex clothing. Take the role players in a Nurse/Police uniform acting out a bedroom nuptial scene. No-one sees them dressing-up but themselves.
The topic of dressing-up, oversimplified and marginalized as fashion, is a serious subject touching the inner-most avatars. Dressing-up is not receiving the scholarly treatise it deserves being sketchy in many respects by scholars, relegating dressing-up to trivial or peripheral significance (Herbert Blumer, The Sociological Quarterly).
Sales of Superman or Batman outfits will attest to the Proteus effect in children while the quality and popularity of computer virtual games signal a complete immersion into the character of the game. Virtual dressing-up, no less! Grown men shooting paint balls at each other don battle fatigues, dressing-up to enter into the spirit of the game.
As for hegemonic oppression? The fashion industry merely adapts to, and exploits, what is already a deep pre-existing need to look good as defined by peers, tempered by a personal sense of aesthetics, to achieve a measure of personal significance as well as peer acceptance.
If fashion were ever to succumb to economic oblivion, dressing-up is here to stay, in one form or another.
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