Table Of ContentAppearance and Identity
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Appearance and Identity
Fashioning the Body in Postmodernity
Llewellyn Negrin
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appearance and identity
Copyright © Llewellyn Negrin, 2008.
All rights reserved.
First published in 2008 by PALGRAVE MACMILLAN® in the United
States—a division of St. Martin’s Press LLC, 175 Fifth Avenue, New York,
NY 10010.
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world, this is by Palgrave Macmillan, a division of Macmillan Publishers
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Palgrave® and Macmillan® are registered trademarks in the United States,
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ISBN-13: 978-0-230-60762-0
ISBN-10: 0-230-60762-4
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First edition: December 2008
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Contents
Preface vii
Introduction 1
1 Appearance and Identity 9
2 Feminism and Fashion 33
3 Cosmetics and the Female Body 53
4 Cosmetic Surgery and the Eclipse of Identity 75
5 Body Art and Men’s Fashion 97
6 Ornament and the Feminine 117
7 The Postmodern Gender Carnival 139
Notes 163
References 173
Author Index 185
Subject Index 187
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Preface
This book began its life as a series of articles that I have published over
the last decade. Chapter 2—“Feminism and Fashion”—is based on a much
revised version of an article, “The Self as Image: A Critical Appraisal of
Postmodern Theories of Fashion,” published in Theory, Culture & Society
16 (3), 1999: 99–118, while an earlier version of Chapter 3—“Cosmetics
and the Female Body”—appeared in The European Journal of Cultural
Studies 3 (1), 2000: 83–101. The chapter entitled “Cosmetic Surgery and
the Eclipse of Identity” was originally published in Body & Society 8 (4),
2002: 21–42, and a shorter version of Chapter 5—“Body Art and Men’s
Fashion”—appears in The Men’s Fashion Reader edited by Andrew Reilly
and Sarah Cosbey, first edition, 333–46, copyright 2008 by Fairchild Pub-
lications, Inc. Reprinted by permission of Fairchild Books, a division of
Condé Nast, Inc. Finally, an earlier version of Chapter 6—“Ornament and
the Feminine”—was published in Feminist Theory 7 (2), 2006: 219–35.
I am very grateful to Rita Felski and Claire Colebrook, who commis-
sioned the last of these articles and provided me with invaluable feedback
during the course of writing it. Also, my thanks go to Andrew Reilly and
Sarah Cosbey, who asked me to write on the topic of body art and men’s
fashion for The Men’s Fashion Reader, and who provided me with useful
feedback on this chapter. I am also appreciative of the anonymous referees
who gave me insightful feedback on all of the other articles mentioned
above. I have also benefited from the comments received when I presented
earlier versions of some of these chapters at conferences and symposiums.
In particular, thanks go to the participants at the conference Culture and
Identity: City, Nation, World, organized by the editors of the journal Theory,
Culture & Society in Berlin, August 1995, where I presented the first incar-
nation of my chapter “Feminism and Fashion,” and also to the participants
in the Getty Summer Institute, Department of Art History and Visual
Culture, University of Rochester, New York, where I presented a paper on
“Cosmetics and the Female Body” in July 1999. I am also appreciative of
the feedback that my colleagues and graduate students at the University of
Tasmania have given me on the various occasions when I have presented
versions of some of these chapters. Thanks also to Janet Wolff, whose
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VIII PREFACE
encouraging remarks on my initial proposal for this book spurred me on
to bring this project to fruition. Finally, my greatest vote of appreciation
goes to my husband, Don Cartwright, who painstakingly proofread the
entire manuscript, and without whose encouragement and support, this
book would never have happened, and also to my parents, Marjorie and
Angelo, who have always been there for me.
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Introduction
Over the last twenty years or so, there has been a major reevaluation
of fashion, both in terms of its legitimacy as an area of serious aca-
demic investigation and its significance in contemporary Western culture.
Whereas, in the past, there was a largely dismissive attitude towards fash-
ion, which was seen as a subject unworthy of consideration since it was
concerned with the “trivial” realm of appearances, the last two decades
have seen a burgeoning of academic studies in this area.
At the same time as the importance of fashion as a realm of serious
investigation has been recognized, there has been a discernable shift
away from the notion of fashion as an instrument of oppression to
one that embraces it as an avenue of self expression and creativity, as is
evident in a number of recent writings on fashion such as Adorned in
dreams (1987 [1985]) by Elizabeth Wilson; Women and fashion: A new
look (1989) by Caroline Evans and Minna Thornton; The empire of fashion
(1994) by Gilles Lipovetsky; Sex and suits: The evolution of modern dress
(1994) by Anne Hollander; and Fresh lipstick: Redressing fashion and
feminism (2005) by Linda M. Scott.
In contrast to the conservatism of traditional folk costume, fashion is
lauded for its openness to change and love of experimentation. As Lipov-
etsky writes, for instance:
. . . Fashion is less a sign of class ambition than a way out of the world of
tradition. It is one of the mirrors that allow us to see what constitutes our
most remarkable historical destiny: the negation of the age-old power of the
traditional past, the frenzied modern passion for novelty, the celebration of
the social present. (1994, 4)
Likewise, Hollander praises fashion for the “great sartorial freedom and
range” it offers, which “reflects the social freedom of the last quarter of a
century, when social custom no longer offers strong guidance for appropri-
ate dress” (1994, 191).
In a similar vein, other recent theorists of fashion, such as Kaja Silver-
man (1986) and Evans and Thornton (1989), have embraced the con-
stant changeableness of fashion as something that challenges the fixity of
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Description:This book critically examines recent theories of fashion which have sought to legitimize its pleasures and defend it as an avenue for self-expression. Through a series of essays which address different aspects of fashion in postmodern culture including the wearing of makeup, cosmetic surgery, tattoo
