Fashion - A Device for Confining Women to an Inferior Social Order

             The male and female body shapes are physically different, therefore clothing for each gender has to be tailored to fit these variations. Women's clothing generally incorporates more darts to accommodate the bust and hips, while men's clothing has a more rectangular shape to cover their less curvaceous body. If these curve accommodating darts are the only adjustments necessary to make male clothing fit females, we have to ask why men and women's fashions have been so different throughout history? Can different still obtain equality? Are women confined to a lower social order? If so, what confines them? There are many different views to these questions, but no right or wrong answers, just opinions. I will be discussing some of these opinions, as well as contributing my own to help give a broader view of how, and indeed if 'fashion has been a device for confining women to an inferior social order' (Finkelstein, 1996 p.56)
             The main reason for our fashions being so different is because 'we define ourselves as being male or female through a system of opposition' (Schreier, 1989 p.4). Our fashions have therefore served to divide us through accentuating the physical differences. Men are expected to conform to wearing clothing that is deemed by the society in which they live to be masculine, and women, feminine, for example, during the 1950's men wore suits that comprised of trousers and a hard-edged jacket to accentuate their broad shoulders and in turn their physical strength.
             During most eras the requirements for feminine fashions were garments that enhanced the female figure, however in the Victorian society (which lasted approximately 90 years from 1820 until about 1910), the fashion was to accentuate the female figure to a point where it became a caricature. Large breasts and hips were admired, while it was thought 'the tinier the female waist, the more beautiful a figure' (Harris, 1996 [Internet]). Unfortunately...

More Essays:

APA     MLA     Chicago
Fashion - A Device for Confining Women to an Inferior Social Order. (1969, December 31). In MegaEssays.com. Retrieved 18:42, March 28, 2024, from https://www.megaessays.com/viewpaper/11730.html