The Politics of Fashion
| Module title | The Politics of Fashion |
|---|---|
| Module code | POC3100 |
| Academic year | 2020/1 |
| Credits | 15 |
| Module staff | Delacey Tedesco (Convenor) |
| Duration: Term | 1 | 2 | 3 |
|---|---|---|---|
| Duration: Weeks | 11 |
| Number students taking module (anticipated) | 10 |
|---|
Module description
The politics of fashion is a global concern, yet one that operates through uniquely intimate, everyday sites. Fashion in the modern world has always connected to deeply political processes, such as urbanisation, industrialisation, colonialism, racialisation, slavery and gender and class hierarchies. Now, fashion can be connected to global ecological collapse, global circuits of materials, finance, and imagery, and global patterns of production, labour, and consumption. In other words, the everyday practices of fashion help us get at questions that are central to critical global politics, such as sustainability, social justice, and decolonisation. How can we understand the politics of the clothes we buy and wear? How can we understand the politics of who produces these clothes, and under what conditions? How can we understand the social, political, and ecological relationships that are signalled through fashion imagery in magazines, advertisements, and social media and materialised through production and consumption? And why, ultimately, does fashion matter for understanding global politics?
No prior knowledge skills or experiences are required to take this module, and it is suitable for specialist and non-specialist students. This interdisciplinary module is suitable for students studying Politics, International Relations, Geography, Flexible Combined Honours, the Humanities, Fashion and Fine Arts.
Module aims - intentions of the module
This module will focus on key approaches to the global politics of fashion, through which we will encounter and analyse different conceptual and empirical accounts of both ‘fashion’ and ‘politics.’ This module aims to introduce and analyse the political implications of interdisciplinary research on global fashion, considering high-end designer fashion, local independent designers, and global systems of production and consumption. Through this module, you will engage with the burgeoning theoretical and empirical research on the political sovereignties, subjectivities, economies, ecologies, and geographies that we enact and contest when we participate in the world of fashion. This module will enable you to analyse critically everyday practices of fashion as exemplary of broader challenges in contemporary politics. You will therefore develop crucial strengths in political analysis across a diverse range of theoretical frameworks and practical contexts. By engaging claims about the aesthetic, sovereign, economic, embodied, gendered, colonial, and spatial/geographic dimensions of fashion, you will gain a deeper understanding of debates over contemporary definitions and practices of global politics
Intended Learning Outcomes (ILOs)
ILO: Module-specific skills
On successfully completing the module you will be able to...
- 1. Describe and critically assess the strengths and weaknesses of central definitions of politics developed in fashion research
- 2. Articulate verbally, creatively, and in writing accurate and insightful accounts of the connections between everyday practices of fashion and global configurations of political relationships.
- 3. Analyse a particular site of fashion practice as a site of politics, with clear and coherent definitions of key terms and effective integration of theoretical literature.
ILO: Discipline-specific skills
On successfully completing the module you will be able to...
- 4. Synthesise and critically assess a defined field of political research.
- 5. Demonstrate through oral and written course work the ability to extend and revise political concepts to account for new fields of theoretical and empirical research.
- 6. Engage effectively with interdisciplinary research and articulate the significance of this work for analyses of contemporary political life.
ILO: Personal and key skills
On successfully completing the module you will be able to...
- 7. Work independently and in groups to engage in spontaneous discussion and defence of arguments in class, to prepare presentations for class discussion, and to contribute to a productive classroom.
- 8. Work independently to research, formulate, write, and present critical analyses that engage a complex mix of theoretical and empirical content.
- 9. Research, apply, and present your analyses through alternative practices of aesthetic knowledge creation, such as collage, curation, video, or photography.
- 10. Develop and extend a self-reflexive academic practice that is both independent and collaborative, including: assessing strengths and weaknesses, identifying goals and work plans, integrating feedback, and envisioning future work paths.
Syllabus plan
Whilst the module’s precise content may vary from year to year, it is envisaged that the syllabus will cover some or all of the following topics.
The Political World of Fashion:
- What is ‘Fashion’?
- Politics, pop culture, and aesthetics
- Rethinking fashion as political site and political method
Approaches to the Politics of Fashion:
- The International Politics of Fashion
- Political Economies of Fashion
- Fashioning Rural/Urban Political Geographies
- Gender, Bodies, and Fashion
- Politics of Fashion Curation
- Politics of Fashion Sustainability
Sites of Fashion Politics:
- Fashion Shows and the Fashion Calendar
- The Fashion Protest: fashionrevolution.org
- Student-led research sites and case studies
Learning activities and teaching methods (given in hours of study time)
| Scheduled Learning and Teaching Activities | Guided independent study | Placement / study abroad |
|---|---|---|
| 22 | 128 | 0 |
Details of learning activities and teaching methods
| Category | Hours of study time | Description |
|---|---|---|
| Scheduled Learning and Teaching | 22 | 11 x 2 hour Students will be given guided opportunities to initiate and lead seminar discussions. Students will be expected to engage with their peers and provide constructive feedback on occasion. |
| Guided Independent Study | 43 | Private study students are expected to read suggested texts and make notes prior to seminar sessions. |
| Guided Independent Study | 85 | Assessment reading, preparation and writing and writing: 10 hours to formative, peer review, and self-assessment activities: 50 hours to independent research, reading, and writing; 20 hours to creative research practice; 5 hours to presentation preparation |
Formative assessment
| Form of assessment | Size of the assessment (eg length / duration) | ILOs assessed | Feedback method |
|---|---|---|---|
| Creative Research Practice Proposal | 500 words + 3 annotated sources | 1-6, 8-10 | Verbal & written |
Summative assessment (% of credit)
| Coursework | Written exams | Practical exams |
|---|---|---|
| 80 | 0 | 20 |
Details of summative assessment
| Form of assessment | % of credit | Size of the assessment (eg length / duration) | ILOs assessed | Feedback method |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Critical Summary: Politics, Fashion and Creative Methods | 20 | 1250 words | 1-6, 8-10 | Written |
| Group Research Presentation | 20 | 10 minutes | 1-10 | Written; Peer: verbal |
| Creative Research Practice | 60 | Creative + 2,500 word exegesis | 1-6, 8-10 | Written |
Details of re-assessment (where required by referral or deferral)
| Original form of assessment | Form of re-assessment | ILOs re-assessed | Timescale for re-assessment |
|---|---|---|---|
| Critical Summary: Politics, Fashion, Methods | Critical Summary: Politics, Fashion, Methods 1250 words | 1-6, 8-10 | August/September reassessment period |
| Creative Research Practice | Creative Research Practice (Creative + 2,500 words) | 1-6, 9-10 | August/September reassessment period |
| Group Research Presentation | 1,000 word summary | 1-10 | August/September assessment period |
Indicative learning resources - Basic reading
Core (selections only):
Behnke, A. 2016. The International Politics of Fashion: Being Fab in a Dangerous World. Abingdon and New York: Routledge. (e-book available)
Bleiker, R. 2017. In Search of Thinking Space: Reflections on the Aesthetic Turn in International Political Theory. Millennium Vol. 45(2) 258–264.
Bleiker, R. 2009. The Aesthetic Turn in International Political Theory. Aesthetics and World Politics. Basingstoke and New York: Palgrave McMillan. 18-47.
Crewe, L. 2010. Wear:where? The convergent geographies of architecture and fashion. Environment and Planning A 42: 2093-2108. DOI:10.1068/a42254
-----. 2008. Ugly beautiful?: Counting the cost of the global fashion Industry. Geography 93 (1): 25-33.
Entwhistle, J. and A. Rocamora. The field of fashion materialized: A study of London Fashion Week. Sociology 40 (1): 735-751.
Grayson, K., M. Davies and S. Philpott. 2009. Pop Goes IR? Researching the Popular Culture–World Politics Continuum. Politics 29 (3): 155-163.
May, Christopher. 2016. Towards an international politics of fashion (book review). LSE Review of Books, October 7. http://blogs.lse.ac.uk/lsereviewofbooks/2016/10/07/book-review-the-international-politics-of-fashion-being-fab-in-a-dangerous-world-by-andreas-behnke/.
McRobbie, A. 2013. Fashion matters Berlin: City-spaces, women’s working lives, new social enterprise? Cultural Studies 27 (6): 982-1010.
Parkins, I. 2015. Hurricane Sandy in Vogue. Australian Feminist Studies 30 (85): 221-237.
Van de Peer, A. 2014. So last season: The production of the fashion present in the politics of time. Fashion Theory 18 (3): 317-340. DOI 10.2752/175174114X13938552557880.
Weller, S. 2013. Consuming the city: Public fashion festivals and the participatory economies of urban spaces in Melbourne, Australia. Urban Studies 50 (14): 2853-2868.
Indicative learning resources - Web based and electronic resources
Fashion Revolution: www.fashionrevolution.org
Business of Fashion: www.businessoffashion.com
Fashion Week Online: http://fashionweekonline.com
| Credit value | 15 |
|---|---|
| Module ECTS | 7.5 |
| Module pre-requisites | None |
| Module co-requisites | None |
| NQF level (module) | 6 |
| Available as distance learning? | No |
| Origin date | 01/05/2017 |
| Last revision date | 20/01/2020 |
