The Invisible Man‘troubling’ economic consequences, and notes, as others have done, that in
seeking to realize its profit-seeking aims, ‘fashion is preservative of the status
quo while appearing to make the claims of being the opposite’.^23 There does
not appear to be a single aspect of the subject which pleases or excites
Finkelstein. When first acquainted with her work, I could not quite believe
the forcefulness of its antipathy towards the subject. I was not much reassured
to read Palmer’s review of Finkelstein’s ‘After a Fashion’ in Fashion Theory.
Having established that the book appears to have been written as an
introductory text to fashion theory aimed primarily at undergraduate
students, the reviewer notes that it ‘seems as though Finkelstein is trying to
convince herself as to the importance of studying fashion and leaves the reader
with a sense that despite all her scholarship and wide reading she is still
ambivalent on the subject’.^24
Of course, any of Finkelstein’s arguments can be countered by opposing
views from other texts. Jennifer Craik, for example rejects the argument that
‘ “fashion” refers exclusively to clothing behaviour in capitalist economies’^25
and Malcolm Barnard points out that the ‘possibility that fashion and clothing
are deceptive in that they may be used to mislead, applies equally well to all
other means of communication’.^26 The reason for citing Finkelstein’s
objections here though, is not primarily to counter them but to demonstrate
the singularity of a subject that can be legitimately studied and practised,
yet confronts the student with discourses which are innately hostile. Elizabeth
Wilson has shown that even the works of Veblen and Barthes, so frequently
referred to in academic texts on fashion, share a common view that fashion
is ‘morally absurd and in some way objectionable’.^27
The Intellectual Assault CourseIn his introduction to The Fashion System Barthes asks ‘Can clothing signify
without recourse to the speech which describes it, comments upon it, and
provides it with a system of signifieds and signifiers abundant enough to
- Finkelstein, J., ‘Chic – a Look That’s Hard to See’,Fashion Theory, vol. 3 issue 3,
Oxford: Berg, 1999, pp. 363–85. - Palmer, A., ‘Book Review: After a Fashion’,Fashion Theory, vol. 1, issue 1, Oxford:
Berg, 1997, pp. 111–14. - Craik, J., The Face of Fashion: Cultural Studies in Fashion, London: Routledge, 1994,
p. 5. - Barnard, M., Fashion as Communication, London: Routledge, 1996.
- Wilson, E., Adorned in Dreams: fashion and modernity, London: Virago, 1985, p. 58.