Semiotics fashion

Object of semiotics fashion

The fashion semiotics is based on the classical theory of sign systems by Yu. M. Lotman , according to which fashion is one of the verbal-visual secondary modeling systems. The object of fashion semiotics is the costume as a sign system. The semiotic function of a fashion is due to its ability to distribute important cultural codes in the field of non-verbal communication and thereby influence verbal communication ^[3] .

Principal researchers of fashion semiotics

The semiotic approach to the study of fashion gained wide popularity in the 60s of the 20th century, although its early manifestations are present in Thorstein Veblen ^[2] . An attempt to interpret the symbolism of clothes is presented in his book The Theory of the Idle Class : An Economic Study of Institutions. According to Veblen, the fashion mechanism operates on the basis of the desire of the upper class to demonstrate their material well-being, and of the middle strata to reproduce the consumer model alien to them and symbolically bring their social position closer to a higher one. Veblen compares the European aristocracy of the end of the 19th century, whose privilege was expressed not so much in wealth as in etiquette and special culture, with the highest strata of American society of the same period. For lack of other means, rich American owners resorted to demonstrative use of consumer goods, including fashionable clothes. In addition to the high price, clothing differed underlined impracticality ^[4] .

A significant part of the attractiveness characteristic of patent leather shoes, immaculate lingerie, a shining hat in the shape of a cylinder and a walking stick, which so aggravates the inherent self-esteem of the gentleman, comes from the fact that they contain a meaningful hint: their owner, so dressed, cannot be implicated to any occupation, directly and directly representing a public benefit. Exquisite clothing serves its purpose not only because of its high price, but also on the grounds that it is an emblem of idleness. It not only proves that the wearer is able to consume relatively large values, but at the same time - that he consumes without producing ^[5] .

A prominent representative of the semiotic approach to the analysis of fashion is Roland Barth ^[2] . In his book, The Fashion System , Barth views fashion as an aspect of the iconic organism of culture, the myth , based on the work of Swiss linguist Ferdinand de Saussure . According to Bart, fashion combines three language systems: image clothing, clothing description, and real clothing. In turn, the clothing description has three essential components: an object, a caliper and an option. The change of fashion is due to changes in the options, and variations of the caliper form the concept of elegance. Clothing has a technological, iconic and verbal structure. The first is the source language-code, the other two are translations from the source language ^[6] . All three elements are included in the vestimentary matrix , which projects the description of clothes on its image and allows “to see through inert materials” ^[7] .

Roland Barth’s structuralist approach formed the basis of Jean Baudrillard’s postmodern fashion concept ^[2] . In his essay “Fashion, or Extravaganza Code,” which is part of the book “ Symbolic Exchange and Death, ” Baudrillard considers fashion as a system of signs that have lost the connection between the signified and signifying to Bart ^[4] .

Fashion is not a drift of signs, but their floating state, like the current floating rate of currency notes. <...> Fashion is a stage of pure speculation in the field of signs, where there is no imperative of coherence or reference, just like floating currencies have no stable parity or convertibility into gold; for fashion (and, in the near future, probably, for the economy), the characteristic cyclicity and repeatability follow from such non-determinism, while a continuous linear order follows from determinism (signs or production) ^[8] .

In the context of semiotics, fashion and, in particular, costume as a sign system, represents a particular area of ​​study and has a number of unique features:

• The combination of informative and practical functions, not peculiar to objects of cultural and community purposes. The conceptual content of the character of the costume is inseparable from its utilitarian application and formal qualities.
• The costume complex involves the physical presence of a person in contrast to other objects of decorative and applied arts and everyday life.
• The symbiosis of garments and a person is a complex of signs of a different nature: personal characteristics, social and ethnic identity, preferences, attitude to religion, profession, and others.
• Ability to symbolic non-verbal communication even in the absence of verbal communication.
• The existence of restrictions on the ability to read costume signs, for example, due to the conscious protection of information or its deliberate distortion.
• Anthropometric forms as an indispensable basis of the sign system of the suit, which, as a result, can only be improved, and not replaced with something fundamentally new. The human desire to transform the figure and go beyond the established framework is one of the foundations of the modern fashion industry ^[1] .
• The implicit nature of the sign system of the suit and, as a result, the often unconscious communication process.

A costume as an integral part of modern visual discourse is a material carrier of the meaning spread by fashion and becomes a definite act, a method not so much aesthetic as existential experience ^[3] .

The sign communicative system of the costume includes two core types of codes that exist in the global cultural space: traditional and fashionable ^[1] .

Steady and not subject to cyclic variability, traditional codes are divided into universal and ethnic . Universal traditional codes are vividly expressed in a professional dress code . For example, a white medical form that conveys a message about sterility; uniform, broadcasting the image of the company; business suit as a sign of rationalism and practicality ^[9] . Ethnic traditional codes carry an informational message about ethnic stereotype , broadcasting information about both an individual and the people and the country of their residence. Such codes store the centuries-old experience of generations and are actively used in the fashion industry as a source of creativity ^[1] .

Fashion codes are subject to temporary changes in iconic meanings and exist in a society with a diffuse class structure, opening up the possibility for social migrations and self-realization. Fashionable codes are inherent in the basic values ​​of fashion - modernity, versatility, demonstrativeness and play ^[10] . They carry the idea of ​​a sociocultural phenomenon of fashion, which is based on the dualism of human needs - the desire to stand out and the desire to emulate ^[11] . Fashion codes are divided into universal and conceptual ^[1] .

Universal fashion codes are reflected in modern mass-produced suits with a stable base. Simplification of the form of clothing in combination with the complication of its secondary symbolic meanings leads to an increase in the role of interpretation in fashion and a change in its functioning ^[12] . A modern universal fashionable costume is created from signs and codes of the past and present, quoting becomes the main method of its replication. Conceptual fashion codes are formed under the significant influence of works of art and refer to what lies beyond the material form: the author's interpretation, an analysis of the understanding of the sign system of the costume as a whole. They allow us to reflect the world around us in its entirety and transform it in accordance with the designer’s subjective desires ^[1] .

Visual communication of political change

Fashion changes are parallel to the processes of political change and carry out their semiotic communication. So, for example, the beginning of perestroika (unified free clothing as a symbol of social equality and collectivism ), the collapse of the USSR (strengthening of ethnic components, knitted clothing as a symbol of commodity deficit ), re-election of President Boris N. Yeltsin and the mode of competitive oligarchy (sharp the contrast of male and female images as a symbol of gender inequality) ^[13] .

The sign of the subculture costume

The costumes of representatives of youth subcultures are of a pronounced sign character ^[14] . For example, baubles that hippies wore are a specially designed system of signs, a symbol of belonging to a fraternity and a certain length of service in it ^[15] . Another sign of the hippie is a bandage on the forehead as a symbol of the path and distancing from society ^[14] .

The semiotic approach to the analysis of the phenomenon of fashion, based on the “ System of Fashion ” by Rolan Barth , is the subject of extensive discussion. The concept of fashion as a combination of codes to be decoded and containing hidden meaning is subject to criticism . Modern researchers consider fashion as evidence that the formation of meaning can be based not only on the principle of sign exchange ^[16] . Not every sign relationship is necessarily structural ^[17] . The irreducibility of the content to the final form as a basis, forming a fashion, brings it closer to the idea of ​​the sacred , which is not amenable to systematic sign reading and analysis ^[18] .

• Semiotics
• Semiotics Cinema
• Fashion
• Suit
• Communication (social science)
• Sign
• Non-verbal communication

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• Baudrillard J. Symbolic exchange and death. - Moscow: Dobrosvet, 2000. - 387 p. ISBN 5-7913-0047-6
• Veblen T. Theory of the idle class. M .: Progress, 1984. - 367 c.
• Hoffman A., B. Fashion and people. The new theory of fashion and fashion behavior. SPb., 2004. - 208 p. ISBN 5-469-00129-6
• Koneva, A.V. Fashion in Social Being: From Inclusion to Exclusivity / A.V. Koneva // Fundamental Problems of Cultural Studies: Proc. Art. According to the materials of the congress / resp. ed. D.L. Spivak. - Vol. 6: Cultural heritage: From the past to the future. - M .: New chronograph: Eidos, 2009.
• Kristeva Yu. Meaning and fashion // Selected Works: the destruction of poetics. - Moscow: ROSSPEN, 2004. - 656 p. ISBN 5-8243-0500-5
• Lotman Yu. M. Inside the thinking worlds. M .: "Languages ​​of Russian culture", 1996. - 464 p. ISBN 5-7859-0006-8
• Lotman, Yu. M. Semiiosphere / Yu. M. Lotman. - SPb .: Art-SPB, 2000. - 704 p. ISBN 978-5-210-01562-4
• Saussure F. The course of general linguistics. M .: Editorial URSS, 2004. - 257 p.