The fashioned body - Joanne Entwistle

The Fashioned Body
provides a wideranging and originaloverview of fashion and dress from an historical and sociologicalperspective. The book gives a clear summary of the theoriessurrounding the role and function of fashion in modern society, andexamines how fashion plays a crucial role in the formation ofmodern identity through its articulation of the body, gender andsexuality.

In examining fashion in relation to the body, the book offers amuch needed synthesis between the literature on fashion and dress,which has tended to ignore the body, and the sociology of the body,which has tended to marginalize fashion and dress. Entwistle showshow an understanding of fashion and dress requires an understandingof the meanings acquired by the body in culture
since it is thebody that fashion speaks to and which is dressed in almost allsocial situations and encounters. She argues that while fashionrefers to a specific system of dress originating in the west, allcultures dress the body in the same way, making it a crucialfeature of social order. Drawing on the work of Douglas, Foucault,MerleauPonty, Goffman and Bourdieu, the book offers insights intothe connections that need to be made between the body, fashion anddress, arguing for an account of fashion and dress as situatedbodily practice.

The Fashioned Body
will be an invaluable resource forstudents and academics interested in the social role of fashion anddress in modern culture and will also be of interest to studentsand researchers in the areas of consumption, cultural studies,gender studies and feminist theory.