Clothing as Material Culture
Title | Clothing as Material Culture PDF eBook |
Author | Susanne Küchler |
Publisher | Berg Publishers |
Pages | 208 |
Release | 2005-03-01 |
Genre | Design |
ISBN | 9781845200671 |
This book puts the material back into clothing. In recent years social scientists have become increasingly interested in theories of fashion, but have rarely directly addressed the material qualities of clothing. By contrast, traditional studies of dress have focused on textiles but often neglect the larger cultural context within which dress becomes consumed as clothing. This book fills a major gap by combining these two 'camps' through an expressly material culture approach to clothing. In sustained case studies, Kchler and Miller argue that cloth and clothing are living, vibrant parts of culture and the body. From the recycling of cloth in Africa and India and the use of pattern in the Pacific, to the history of 'wash and wear' and why women wear the wrong clothes to restaurants in London, this book shows the considerable advantage gained by seamlessly combining material and social aspects of dress and textiles.
Clothing Culture, 1350-1650
Title | Clothing Culture, 1350-1650 PDF eBook |
Author | Catherine Richardson |
Publisher | Routledge |
Pages | 473 |
Release | 2017-03-02 |
Genre | History |
ISBN | 1351950924 |
Addressing the subject of clothing in relation to such fundamental issues as national identity, social distinction, gender, the body, religion and politics, Clothing Culture, 1350-1650 provides a springboard into one of the most fascinating yet least understood aspects of social and cultural history. Nowhere in medieval and early modern European society was its hierarchical and social divisions more obviously reflected than in the sphere of clothing. Indeed, one of the few constant themes of writers, chroniclers, diarists and commentators from Chaucer to Pepys was the subject of fashion and clothes. Whether it was lauding the magnificence of court, warning against the vanity of fashion, describing the latest modes, or decrying the habit of the lower orders to ape the dress of their social superiors, people throughout history have been fascinated by the symbolism, power and messages that clothes can project. Yet despite this contemporary interest, clothing as a subject of historical enquiry has been a largely neglected field of academic study. Whilst it has been discussed in relation to various disciplines, it has not in many cases found a place as a central topic of analysis in its own right. The essays presented in this volume form part of a growing recent trend to put fashion and clothing back into the centre ground of historical research. From Russia to Rome, Ireland to France, this volume contains a wealth of examples of the numerous ways clothing was shaped by, and helped to shape, medieval and early modern European society. Furthermore, it demonstrates how the study of clothing can illuminate other facets of life and why it deserves to be treated as a central, rather than peripheral, facet of European history.
Material Culture in the Social World
Title | Material Culture in the Social World PDF eBook |
Author | Tim Dant |
Publisher | McGraw-Hill Education (UK) |
Pages | 239 |
Release | 1999-08-16 |
Genre | Social Science |
ISBN | 0335231314 |
"This should become a core text for second year courses in sociology and cultural studies... it synthesizes a vast body of literature and a complex range of debates into a text which is at once accessible, engaging and stimulating... it will lead to students seeing and thinking about the material world in a totally new light and can be used as a way into key theoretical debates." Keith Tester, Professor of Social Theory, University of Portsmouth In what ways do we interact with material things? How do material objects affect the way we relate to each other? What are the connections between material things and social processes like fashion, discourse, art and design? Through wearing clothes, keeping furniture, responding to the ring of the telephone, noticing the signature on a painting, holding a paperweight and in many other ways, we interact with objects in our everyday lives. These are not merely functional relationships with things but are connected to the way we relate to other people and the culture of the particular society we live in - they are social relations. This engaging book draws on established theoretical work, including that of Simmel, Marx, McLuhan, Barthes and Baudrillard as well as a range of contemporary empirical work from many humanities disciplines. It uses ideas drawn from this work to explore a variety of things - from stone cairns to denim jeans, televisions to penis rings, houses to works of art - to understand something of how we live with them.
Understanding Material Culture
Title | Understanding Material Culture PDF eBook |
Author | Ian Woodward |
Publisher | SAGE |
Pages | 202 |
Release | 2007-05-09 |
Genre | Social Science |
ISBN | 144623956X |
"In his interdisciplinary review of material culture, Ian Woodward goes beyond synthesis to offer a theoretically innovative reconstruction of the field. It is filled with gems of conceptual insight and empirical discovery. A wonderful book." - Jeffrey C. Alexander, Yale University "A well-grounded and accessible survey of the burgeoning field of material culture studies for students in sociology and consumption studies. While situating the field within the history of intellectual thought in the broader social sciences, it offers detailed and accessible case studies. These are supplemented by very useful directions for further in-depth reading, making it an excellent undergraduate course companion." - Victor Buchli, University College London Why are i-pods and mobile phones fashion accessories? Why do people spend thousands remodelling their perfectly functional kitchen? Why do people crave shoes or handbags? Is our desire for objects unhealthy, or irrational? Objects have an inescapable hold over us, not just in consumer culture but increasingly in the disciplines that study social relations too. This book offers a systematic overview of the diverse ways of studying the material as culture. Surveying the field of material culture studies through an examination and synthesis of classical and contemporary scholarship on objects, commodities, consumption, and symbolization, this book: introduces the key concepts and approaches in the study of objects and their meanings presents the full sweep of core theory - from Marxist and critical approaches to structuralism and semiotics shows how and why people use objects to perform identity, achieve social status, and narrativize life experiences analyzes everyday domains in which objects are important shows why studying material culture is necessary for understanding the social. This book will be essential reading for students and researchers in sociology, anthropology, cultural studies, consumer behaviour studies, design and fashion studies.
The Culture of Fashion
Title | The Culture of Fashion PDF eBook |
Author | Christopher Breward |
Publisher | Manchester University Press |
Pages | 270 |
Release | 1995-05-15 |
Genre | Art |
ISBN | 9780719041259 |
This illustrated survey of 600 years of fashion investigates its cultural and social meaning from medieval Europe to twentieth-century America. Breward's work provides the reader with a clear guide to the changes in style and taste and shows that clothes have always played a pivotal role in defining a sense of identity and society, especially when concerned with sexual and body politics.
Stuff
Title | Stuff PDF eBook |
Author | Daniel Miller |
Publisher | John Wiley & Sons |
Pages | 149 |
Release | 2013-04-25 |
Genre | Social Science |
ISBN | 0745654967 |
Things make us just as much as we make things. And yet, unlike the study of languages or places, there is no discipline devoted to the study of material things. This book shows why it is time to acknowledge and confront this neglect and how much we can learn from focusing our attention on stuff. The book opens with a critique of the concept of superficiality as applied to clothing. It presents the theories that are required to understand the way we are created by material as well as social relations. It takes us inside the very private worlds of our home possessions and our processes of accommodating. It considers issues of materiality in relation to the media, as well as the implications of such an approach in relation, for example, to poverty. Finally, the book considers objects which we use to define what it is to be alive and how we use objects to cope with death. Based on more than thirty years of research in the Caribbean, India, London and elsewhere, Stuff is nothing less than a manifesto for the study of material culture and a new way of looking at the objects that surround us and make up so much of our social and personal life.
European fashion
Title | European fashion PDF eBook |
Author | Regina Lee Blaszczyk |
Publisher | Manchester University Press |
Pages | 528 |
Release | 2018-02-07 |
Genre | Design |
ISBN | 1526122111 |
The period since 1945 has been a transformative era for the fashion industry. Over the course of seventy years, the fashion world has moved from celebrating the craftsmanship of haute couture to revelling in ever-changing fast-fashion. This volume examines the transition from the old system to the new in a series of case studies grouped around three major themes. Part I focuses on Paris as a creative hub, aiming to understand how the birthplace of haute couture adapted to late-twentieth-century developments. Part II considers the retailer’s role in shaping taste, responding to consumer expectations and disseminating fashion merchandise. Part III looks to alternative visions of the European fashion system that have appeared in unexpected places. The volume is highly interdisciplinary, covering design history, cultural anthropology, ethnography, management studies and the cultural history of business.