Clothing As Symbols

It’s been long since clothes have become more than just practical things. Today, almost all over the world, clothes are a way of displaying one’s individual identity and personality. Style has nowadays become a code.

The primary functions of clothes were very practical and primitive. Firstly, clothes used to protect us from climatic conditions, so basically they had nothing to do with style. Their second function was to cover up our skin, from here resulting modesty of the lack of modesty. Third, clothes used to mark one’s social rank through the use of adornment which often had a clear social significance. To clear things up: Remember those stories in which the king is being thrown out of his kingdom and at the end returns as a normal boy, but putting a crown on his head makes it clear for everyone that he was king.

Today, clothes mean so many different things and their significance has changed so much. A while ago, we wrote an article in which we were saying that what one is, is strongly associated with the way they dress. For example, in a time when women were submissive, they wore corsets and clothes that fitted the role, but once women decided they do not want a submissive life, the way they looked changed to meet the part.

We might look at distant, so-called “undeveloped cultures” with doubt, claiming we are not similar to them, but are. We see how in many ancient or tribal cultures, clothing played an important part: the way one dressed was a message to the community about their religion, status, lifestyle, interests and so on. In the Western world, we have use clothes to transmit the same messages, just that the code is not a written one.

Alison Lurie, an American Pulitzer Price winner said in “The Language Of Clothes” :

“Long before I am near enough to talk to you on the street, in a meeting, or at a party, you announce your sex, age and class to me through what you are wearing – and very possibly give me important information (or misinformation) as to your occupation, origin, personality, opinions, tastes, sexual desires and current mood.”

There was a time in which there were fewer options to choose from when you wanted to speak through your clothes: the 1970s are a good example, as in that time walking down the streets you could tell someone’s political views and thoughts just by the clothes they wore: the hippies had their uniforms and the conservative had theirs.

The clothes we put on have both a functional and a psychological use, even though we might not notice it. Think of everyone you meet throughout the day, mostly of the people you don’t know such as cashiers, people on the subway, people sitting at neighboring tables at the restaurant etc. You can tell so much about them (or about what they try to say about themselves) just by looking at them.

Let’s play a game: Association and exposure

Let’s play a game. You will read a few words and think of the first thing that comes to your mind. The words are: hipster, skater, queen, real-life Barbie, and native American.

OK, now we want to check a few things with you. The people you imagined: the hipster is most likely under 30, the skater wears a loose t-shirt and a cap, the queen is definitely not wearing a bathing suit (if you imagined a queen in a bathing suit let us know), the Barbie carries a purse and the native American has a ray of feathers as headgear. Read further, as it gets more interesting!

Now, we can play the game in reverse: we will say one or two items and you can write on a piece of paper what person/subculture icon you thought of (we would love it if you would write what your wrote in the comments). The words are: baggy pants, dreadlocks, and black and white stripes. We assume you thought of rappers and someone part of the Rastafari movement

The last one was a trick question, as we wanted to show you that your answers can differ as a result of exposure and culture: some of you might have thought of a prison inmate while others might have thought of a mime. Exposure and cultural background have a huge impact. When we said “skater” everyone pretty much thought of the same thing, as skaters have the same attire all around the world. If were to say “Macedonian popular costumes” many people would have no picture in their mind, as they have not been exposed to such clothing. Another example would be the phrase “the Jersey look” which is familiar in the United States, but not common in Europe.

The use of symbols

Symbols are part of our common culture. Through symbol we understand, according to the dictionary: “Something that represents something else by association, resemblance, or convention, especially a material object used to represent something invisible.” The key word here is association. In the game we presented earlier, we were not being racist when we said “you probably imagined the native American with feathers as headgear”, we were just proving how different elements have become to mean something whether we accept it or not. Symbols can be shapes or representations, they can be colors, they can be anything. If you wear a Star of David, you cannot expect someone not to associate it with Judaism, unless the person has never heard of Judaism or the Star of David.

And here we come to another important point, which is real and imaginary symbols. The Star of David is a real symbol: it is the symbol of Judaism, it’s on the flag of Israel and it’s very clear what it means. But there are also imaginary symbols, such as, often times, color interpretation. There are girly colors and boyish colors. It is said that to women appeal colors such as red or pink more because in primitive times they were gatherers and formed their eyes better for things such as berries that they needed to spot, while men are associated with darker colors, as they were hunters and needed to spot better animals which are usually dark-colored.  We can’t know if this is true or not. This has caused many misinterpretations and cultural issues, such as men wearing pink were seen as effeminate or homosexual, when in fact pink can be a very masculine color and has nothing to do with how masculine or feminine someone is. There were and still are many such misconceptions: in the 1880 women who wore pants were seen as rebels, later women with short hair were seen as rebels and the list can go on.

The issue with all these things today is that we have a formed eye for telling how much something costs, and clothes usually also say something about our financial status, which should not happen in a civilized world.

The point of this article is to show that we associate the things we see and feel consciously or unconsciously with messages that we know. Next time you get dressed, think of what you are telling the world with your outfit.

 

Fraquoh and Franchomme

 

 

 

 

 

P.S. We want to hear what you have to say? What did you write when you read the game? Share your answers in the comments below!