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Roland Barthes' SYSTÈME DE LA MODE
By Theo van Leeuwin
Although almost the
whole of Barthes' work is now available in English, Système de la Mode (The System of Fashion') remains untranslated.
Regarded on the Continent as
the major work of Barthes' early period, it remains to most English speaking students of his
oeuvre a closed book.
Why should this be so? Perhaps the author himself
should be blamed, at least in part, for he
has, by his own admission, only reluctantly published the book, three years after its completion, and even then
surrounded it with qualifications. In his foreword he calls it 'already dated'
and la little naive' and asks the reader to take the book as 'a
certain history of semiology', as 'the record of an apprenticeship', rather than as the exposition of 'the
certainties of a discipline'" (SM, p.7). Later he added that, at the time of writing Système
de la Mode, he was caught up
in 'a euphoric dream of scientificity', believed that the methodology of semiotics had been established once and for all,
and that one could now proceed to
the construction of specific semiotics — the semiotics of food, dress, narrative, etc. (1971a, p.99). It was a belief
which, by then, he had come to see as anachronistic. The work of Derrida
and Lacan had, in the meantime, made its influence
felt, and caused the semiotic enterprise to shift its emphases. The sign, in classical semiotics a tool of analysis, had now
become problematic, a concept in
need of deconstruction; the semiotician had now become a 'semioclast' (cf. Gaillard, 1974).
Not only Barthes himself, also
some of his English speaking critics helped to foster an atmosphere of doubt around the
validity of Système de la Mode. Culler criticized the book in no uncertain terms:
...a rather confused, incomplete,
and unverifiable account of the vestimentary code which cannot serve even as a specimen of
formal analysis...
(Culler, 1975,
pp.37-38)
And Thody argued that the
relevance of Barthes' analysis remains confined to Gallic culture:
...what Barthes so aptly calls
the rhetoric of fashion is so much more a feature of the French than of the English
version of Vogue that any translation — even assuming that a suitable dedicated Benedictine monk were available — would be
incomprehensible to the average English reader...
(Thody, 1977, p.108)
As far as Barthes' own doubts are
concerned, I respectfully disagree with the master. In my view Système
de la Mode is not only the most complete statement of his earlier semiotics, but
also, even if, for the most part, still implicitly, the work that marks the beginning of
his second phase. Système de la Mode, as Van Poecke has pointed out
(1978), can be read both as the culmination of the themes which occupied Barthes in Mythologies,
in Elements of Semiology, and, for ex-
18 Aust. J. Cultural Studies I: May 83
ample, in his essays
on photography (the theme of the relation between language and reality approached via the
Hjelmslevian trio denotation/ connotation/ metalanguage; the emphasis on structure and
system) and as the beginning of a new emphasis, an emphasis on what Lacan has called 'the logic of the
signified'. The prominent role of
the signifier in Système de la Mode makes the work also part of the new semiotics, the
semiotics which Barthes defined as 'the science of the signifier' (1971b,
p.614).
To refute in detail criticisms
such as those of Culler and Thody is not the purpose of this paper. But one
remark can be made. Applying Barthes' analysis to contemporary Australian fashion magazines, as I
have done throughout this paper, shows quite conclusively that, more than twenty years after Barthes
analyzed his corpus (the 1959
and 1960 issues of Elle, Vogue, Jardin des Modes, and l'Echo de la Mode), and despite linguistic and cultural barriers,
Barthes' description of the 'language of fashion' remains valid — and a source of insight.
Indeed, it is striking to find, in Australian Vogue, October
1982, a 'fashion statement' almost identical
to one of Barthes' central examples (les imprimes triomphent aux Courses, 'printed fabrics
win the day at the Races'):
...The spring racing season is
here. Best odds: jacket dressing...
(Austr. Vogue, Oct. 1982; p.70)
The fashions may have changed, but
the system of fashion has remained remarkably constant, and Barthes' analysis
is still a valid tool to bring this out. Critics of his analysis would have
done well to try it out for themselves, which, as with all linguistic analysis, can always be done by
anyone who has access to the
language under consideration, and in the case of the 'language of fashion' such access is not difficult to come by.
What follows is a summary of Système
de la Mode —
detailed enough, I hope, to make it possible to analyze the 'language of fashion1
after Barthes' method, and to test
Barthes' description against current fashion magazines. It originated in 1978 as a course studyguide for third year mass
communication students at Macquarie
University, and has since been revised a number of times.
METHODOLOGY
The verbal code and the
vestimentary code: evolution versus change
As speakers of English we are both
'producers' and 'consumers' of that language. With our vocal apparatus we produce
messages, with our ears we consume them. In a sense this is also the case with the vestimentary code,
the language of dress': we dress in a certain
way and so send a message to others; we
perceive how others are dressed and so receive a message from them. But there
is one difference: we do not actually produce the signs ourselves. We use pre-fabricated signs — and even when we make them
ourselves we tend to follow a
prescribed pattern.
As a result, the vestimentary code
does not change in the same way as language proper. Natural languages evolve, and their evolution cannot, ultimately,
be con-
19 Aust. J. Cultural Studies I: May 83
trolled. They cannot
be changed by unilateral decision on the part of a small group of language designers'. Such
'language designers' as poets, copywriters, government departments, may eventually come to Influence language, but the
decision is not theirs. They cannot decide
to take a word out of circulation, for example, and replace it with another, different word. The decision is with the
amorphous mass of English speakers,
and change is usually slow.
The vestimentary code, on the
other hand, does not evolve. It changes. It changes every year by unilateral decision on the part of a small group
of fashion experts: designers,
manufacturers, editors of fashion magazines — the 'fashion group', as Barthes says. And it changes not only in
form, but also in meaning. An item which last year was 'casual' may this
year be 'dressy' (or out of fashion altogether). An item which last year was
'romantic' may this year be 'mature' (cf. SM,
p.219).
For Barthes, who, throughout Système
de la Mode, is very much preoccupied with the methodological purity of his study in
terms of Saussurian linguistics, this not only constitutes the arbitrariness of the fashion sign (an
equivalence between signifier and
signified imposed by decree) but also endows the vestimentary code with a pure synchrony
(during a given year the language of fashion' remains stable, so that the analyst can safely ignore diachronic
considerations).
The real garment and the written garment:
fashion magazines
The annual change of the
vestimentary code means that we have to relearn this code from year to year, and, says Barthes, in this relearning
process fashion magazines have an important
role to play, a 'didactic' role, a role of 'initiation' (SM, p.24).
Fashion magazines can fulfil this
role because of the way in which they combine image and text. Barthes, here as in Elements
of Semiology, does not believe that images can, ultimately, communicate independent
of language. At some stage words are needed to explain the meaning of a purely pictorial
message. Afterwards one may understand other, similar images without the aid of
words — provided they are indeed sufficiently similar. But since neither the
form nor the meaning of dress is very stable in our culture, we have a
continuous need for words to understand the vestimentary message, and it is, to
quite some extent, the fashion
magazine which caters for this need.
This does not mean that we can
consider the texts in fashion magazines without taking the pictorial content into account: the
fashion magazine always presents us both with
the 'iconic garment' and the 'written garment', and that the two must be read in conjunction is evident from the text
itself, encoded in the text by means of
what Barthes calls 'shifters' — cohesive devices such as the, this, above, below, left, right.
The text, however, is central,
the ultimate determiner of meaning. It 'immobilizes perception', imposes on the reading of the image
a fixity of meaning which the image, by itself, cannot achieve:
20
Aust. J. Cultural Studies I: May 83
...an image
unavoidably comprises several levels of perception, and the reader of the image has a certain amount
of freedom in choosing at which level to stop(..) hence the sense of an image
is never certain. The text suppresses this freedom, but also removes this uncertainty;
it translates and imposes a choice, orders the reader to stop his perception of
this dress here (...). directs our gaze to the fabric a dress is made of, or
the belt or accessories with which it is worn. Thus the text has a function of
authority...
(SM, p.24)
In addition the text 'adds
knowledge' to the reading of an image. It can, for example, provide information which the image,
by itself, cannot provide, describe aspects of the garment hidden from view in the
picture, name and classify what is shown in the image, decide on our behalf,
for example, whether a new and slightly different garment should be called a top or a blouse.
And it can introduce into the description the abstract terms (stiffness, whiteness,
transparency) which enable
the garment to enter into functional oppositions.
The text finally adds 'emphasis',
isolates from the picture certain features at the expense of others, in order to affirm their
value for the signification of the costume as a whole ('note the black leather belt').
Barthes is aware that by
choosing to deal with fashion magazine texts, he has chosen for the 'written garment', rather than the
'real garment'. A study of the 'real garment' would, according to Barthes,
amount to a kind of 'phonetics of dress', that is, to a study of the production of the
clothes rather than the way in which
they mean — the 'real garment' does not mean anything, and the only language
which could be applicable to it is the language of work. In fact Barthes goes so far as to say that the actual topic of his
book is, not the language, but the
literature of dress:
... if the garment of fashion
seems a rather odd object for such an intensive study, one should realize that we are dealing here with the relation
that holds also between the world and literature, for isn't literature the institution which converts the real into language, just as does our
written garment? Isn't written
fashion a literature?...
(SM, p.22)
Fashion statements
Fashion magazines contain 'fashion
statements'. Their boundaries do not necessarily coincide with the boundaries of sentences,
and their structure should not, according to Barthes, be described in terms of the grammar of
English, but in terms of the
'grammar' of the vestimentary code, in terms of a 'pseudo syntax , for it is this pseudo
syntax, rather than the grammar of the language of which it makes use, which articulates the
vestimentary meaning (SM, p.57).
The fashion
statements, in turn, consist of a fashion description and a fashion
meaning, and both of these are explicitly stated, something which, in language, is normally restricted to metalinguistic
utterances. Even the link between fashion
21 Aust. J. Cultural Studies I: May 83
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22 Aust. J. Cultural Studies I: May 83
description and fashion meaning
is often explicitly stated. The following fashion statement gives both a description of the form
of the clothes (fashion description) and an indication of the situation for which the clothes are said
to be appropriate (fashion
meaning):
...whether you're off to someone else's
house or entertaining in your own, this page,
Mark and Geoffrey all-in-one suit of cream silk, gathered at the ankle, worn with hand-painted chiffon wrapped apron,
matching scarf...
(Austr. Vogue, June 1977, p.58. See plate 1)
The statement could be
paraphrased as: 'this suit (etc.) signifies home entertainment'.
Another fashion statement, from the same magazine
(p.49) couples a description of fabrics with
the notion of 'femininity', and provides a phrase to make the link between description and meaning explicit
('preview a delicious turn towards'):
...these fresh new cottons preview
a delicious turn towards very feminine fashion.
A statement which could be
paraphrased as: 'cottons signify femininity'.
The four levels of the
vestimentary code
Fashion statements are rich in
rhetoric. Abundant use is made of alliteration, rhyme, inversions of various kinds. Puns and
metaphors occur frequently:
...how else do you
make a full skirt, a top rimmed with embroidered icing, than in the crispest cotton?...
(Austr. Vogue, June 1977; p.50)
Many of the words used,
especially the adjectives, are what Barthes calls termes mixtes, at
once designative, part of the fashion description, and attributive, part of the
rhetoric of fashion, as, perhaps, 'peasant' and 'soft' in this example, again from Australian Vogue (p.50):
... with soft voile peasant
blouse...
This rhetorical element in the fashion statement
constitutes, according to Barthes, a separate
level of meaning, one of four levels:
level 1: the real vestimentary
code
On this level, a signifier (a
certain item of clothing, a certain type of fabric, certain feature(s) of a garment) is associated
with a signified (an occasion for which
the item or type of fabric is appropriate, a 'personality trait') and the union
of this signifier and this signified
constitutes a level 1 sign.
23 Aust. J. Cultural Studies I: May 83
Note that 'real' in this
connection should not be confused with 'real' as in the 'real garment' discussed earlier.
The 'reality' of the 'real vestimentary code' is in fact a 'pseudo reality', constructed by the
system of fashion (SM, p.58).
level 2: the written vestimentary code
On this level, a
written sentence (the fashion statement) is superimposed on the level 1 sign, and a new, more
complex sign is created, of which the written sentence forms the signifier and
the level 1 sign (the 'pseudo reality of fashion') the signified.
level 3: fashion value
The act of writing fashion, of creating level 2 signs,
turns the proposition (e.g. cottons
femininity) into something fashionable. A new signified ('this is fashionable')
is expressed by the written fashion statement. Barthes calls it connotation de la mode, and we translate it here as 'fashion value'.
level 4: the rhetoric of fashion
The phraseology of the fashion
statement, the rhetorical form in which it is couched, is the signifier of a
final level of signification. In the case of Barthes' example ('printed fabrics win the day at the
Races'), the use of the expression 'win
the day' provides such a rhetorical element. It not only denotes the link between printed fabrics and the Races (in which
capacity it could be replaced by a
more neutral expression, e.g. 'signify') but also connotes the competitive element of fashion, the desire to be number one. In
this way fashion does not restrict itself
to vestimentary signification proper, but also provides an ideologically coloured representation of the world.
With a typically Barthian 'geology of the sign':
24 Aust. J. Cultural Studies I: May 83
STRUCTURE OF THE
SIGNIFIER
Fashion descriptions do not give
an exhaustive description of the clothes depicted in the accompanying picture. They concentrate ('immobilize the
perception') on a small number of significant
elements of these clothes. Each fashion description singles out three of these significant elements and each
element fulfills a different function
in the description. The three functions are: object, support, and variant.
Reading two fashion statements:
(a) 'a shirt, with casually open
collar'
(b) 'a shirt, the collar closed for a
dressy effect'
we can, as the first step in our
analysis, reduce the statements to their barest form, divest them of their
rhetoric. Barthes proposes a shorthand notation in which the sign (=) means 'equivalence' and the sign (•) 'simple
combination with':
(a') shirt • collar • open = casual (b') shirt • collar • closed = dressy
Inspection of this pair of
statements, the equivalent of the 'minimal pair' in contrastive linguistics,
shows that it is the non-material element (i.e. the way in which the collar is worn) which is crucial for
the difference in meaning bet-ween (a) and (b). This element is called the variant: the formal element
which, if it is commuted into its opposite, results in a different meaning for
the fashion description.
Once the variant is identified,
the other elements can be isolated: the object is the garment (or type of fabric, or colour) under consideration, the support
that part of the object which allows the
variation. In examples (a) and (b) the shirt is the object, the collar the support. Barthes again uses a formal
notation:
Variations in the structure of the fashion
description may occur, but ultimate-ly it can be reduced to these three elements:
(i) Rather than a
non-material element, the variation may be the addition of a material element. In that case variant and support
are combined, to indicate that the
presence/absence of the support forms the variant:
(ii) It may also be that the
support is not explicitly mentioned, so that object and support combine:
25 Aust. J. Cultural Studies I: May 83
Several chapters of Système de la Mode are
devoted to a systematic inventory and
discussion of the variants which Barthes found in his corpus of fashion statements.
They include shapes (bent/straight; round/square, etc.), variants of fabric (heavy/light; flexible/stiff; transparent/non-transparent, etc.), variants
of 'fit' (ample/tight, etc.), variants of 'continuity' (i.e.
the degree to which the garment is open or can be opened), variants of
position (left/right; front/back, etc.). The variants are almost always stated in terms of binary oppositions,
although more than two terms occur, for example, in some of the variants of
measure (e.g. x centimeters above the ground, anatomical
indications: 'above the knees', 'below the
waist', etc.).
Barthes also compiled
an (alphabetical) list of the categories which occurred as objects and/or supports in his
corpus. This list is even longer and includes 60 headings, among which: means of
fastening, fabric, colour, and parts of garments, e.g. sleeve, tail. Under
these headings the subtypes are enumerated. Subtypes of the category means
of fastening, for example, include zippers, buttons, buckles, drawstrings, hooks, etc. etc.
26 Aust. J. Cultural Studies I: May 83
STRUCTURE OF THE SIGNIFIED
Fashion meanings: ensemble B
Fashion statements can be
divided into two types which Barthes calls ensemble A and ensemble B. For convenience I will
introduce them in reverse order.
Ensemble B statements have fashion meanings which can
be paraphrased as 'in fashion' or 'out of
fashion'. For example:
...Jumpsuits still have a very
strong hold on the young designers' collections...
(Mode, Winter
1977; p.40)
In this type of fashion
statement there is no reference to 'the world', no signifie mondaine relating
the fashion description to places, activities, occupations, etc. As a result the arbitrary, imperative nature of
fashion is here at its most undisguised:
the sign of fashion is a 'tyrannical act' (SM, p.220):
...Long overshirt to be worn over jeans in broad hot
coloured French stripes...
(Mode, Winter
1977; p.31)
It follows that the 'geology of
the sign' which applies to ensemble B statements differs from that given above:
Fashion meanings: ensemble A
Ensemble A fashion statements create reference to
a world outside fashion. To times for which the clothes are suitable:
Geoff Bade has included in his
latest winter collection a whole range of stunning evening wear...
(Mode, Winter
1977; 21)
To places:
... Restaurant length skirt
and tired top in imported English acrylic boucle knit..
(Mode, Winter
1977; p.21)
27 Aust. J. Cultural Studies I: May 83
To activities, or occupations:
...Be a legal secretary that's well
versed in the fashion authority of the 'party of the third part'. Here that important third
piece, the vest, works wonders with new tucked pants, soft tie shirt...
(Vogue Patterns, Spring 1978; p.4)
To the personality of the wearer:
...Assertive, big city casual
looks. Cream jersey dipping low at the back, below, rhinestones, the all-out glitz of
silver fox, sheared mink...
(Austr. Vogue, Oct. 1982, p.67)
The arbitrariness of the fashion sign
is less obvious, less bare in these type A fashion statements: the sign operates here
under the cover of functionality. But
while there is, in fashion statements like ideal shoes for walking, conformity
between the form of the shoes and their purpose, in other fashion statements only a trace of functionality remains. Function
becomes an alibi for the signifying
power of the system of fashion and the functions themselves become largely fictional and mythical, as in this statement,
accompanying a picture set in a lush tropical paradise:
...for exploring the varied and
marvellous scenery, printed voile tunic dress, matching scarf wrapped round hips...
(Austr. Vogue, June 1977; p.54)
From other fashion statements, finally,
function is absent altogether, and the form of the clothes becomes motivated by
cultural values, rather than by purpose:
...Ralph Lauren's is the English
country gentlewoman look: felt hats, lace shirts, Norfolk jackets, long, pleated
skirts...
(Austr. Vogue, Oct. 1982; p.66)
Relation between fashion
description and fashion meaning
Fashion meanings cannot be
analyzed into different components in such a way that these components relate to the components of the fashion
description. For example in
...the garden of one of Pacific
Harbour's private villas, fine tulle jacket and skirt, embroidered and piped, with corselette in
knitted cotton...
(Austr. Vogue, June 1977; p.57)
We cannot assume that 'fine tulled jackets' go with
gardens, 'embroidered and piped skirts' with
Fiji's Pacific Harbour, and 'corselettes in knitted cotton' with private villas. The fashion meaning is 'holistic'.
Barthes nevertheless distinguishes three
different relations which can hold between fashion descriptions and fashion meanings:
(i) the
'AUT' relation (exclusive/disjunctive relation)
in which the same object/support
has one meaning for one variant, another for another variant:
28 Aust. J. Cultural Studies I: May 83
... Harvey Foster jumpsuits, to be worn over sweaters
during the day, and as slinky, strappy styles
for after dark...
(Mode, Winter 1977; p.74)
(ii) the 'VEL' relation
(inclusive/disjunctive relation)
in which one fashion description
can have two or more meanings:
...sensational, whether you're off
to someone else's house or entertaining in your own, this page, Mark and Geoffrey
all-in-one suit of cream silk, gathered at the ankle, worn with handpainted
chiffon wrapped apron, matching scarf...
(Austr. Vogue, June 1977, p.58)
(iii) the 'ET' relation (conjunctive
relation)
jn which two or more elements are
combined into one fashion meaning, as 'garden', 'private villa', and 'Pacific Harbour' in
the example above.
THE RHETORIC OF
FASHION
'Writing' and ideology
In the final section of Système
de la Mode, Barthes discusses, in turn, the rhetoric of the fashion description ('garment poetics'), the rhetoric of
the fashion meaning ('the world of
fashion'), and the rhetoric of the link between the two ('the logic of
fashion'). Before doing so he points out that the three rhetorics share
one and the same mode of signifying (ecriture, or 'writing'), and one
and the same type of signification (the
ideology of fashion).
To define 'writing',
Barthes opposes it to 'style'. Whereas style is individual, writing is the practice of a collective, an 'ethos' in
which both methods of writing and thematics
are invested with a collective vision. For this reason fashion, however much it aspires to literature and copies
the tone of it, never 'achieves' literature,
but only 'signifies' it (SM, p.232).
The signified of the rhetoric of
fashion is 'latent' and 'nebulous' because its ideological nature must be masked, it must
appear natural and unproblematic. What is in fact a symbol (in the Peircean sense) must
seem an index which relies for its decoding on knowledge already constituted in the reader; the
signification of fashion
rhetoric, like all connotative signification, is 'received, but not read' (SM, p.235).
Garment poetics
The phraseology of
the fashion descriptions, in contrast to that of the fashion meanings, is
relatively poor in rhetoric. Precise, even technical descriptions. If rhetoric
enters into them at all, it is a low key rhetoric, preferring, for example, the termes mixtes in which both denotative and
connotative elements are present, terms like
'soft', 'feminine', 'body-hugging1, etc.
29 Aust. J. Cultural Studies I: May 83
30 Aust. J. Cultural Studies I: May 83
Garment poetics nevertheless
contributes a great deal to the ideological signification of the fashion statement. First of all, it dignifies
fashion with cultural values — a culture,
Barthes notes, which is that of the schoolgirl, organized, as it were, in terms of the school curriculum:
(i) nature
A fashion statement accompanying a picture of a
model in a flowery dress reads:
...American cotton in full
flower...
(Austr. Vogue, June 1977; p.51)
(ii) Geography (the 'exotic')
...the purity of white meets its match in
Patmos, where the whitewashed walls of
Chora conceal cool rooms of luxury in private villas that have been restored in perfect harmony with traditional village
life...
(Austr. Vogue, Oct. 1982; p.112)
(iii) History ('nostalgia')
...triangular lapels buttoned
back, necks spilling lacy jabots or tied high with black silk, Venetian Inqusitiion toques, inset
right, Black suits, the skirts slim and
wrap-draped...
(Austr. Vogue, Oct. 1982; p.66)
...Long trench coats in gabardine
and tweed, storm coats full of nostalgia for World War II...
(Austr. Vogue, Oct. 1982; p.66)
(iv) Art
A fashion statement accompanying a picture of a model
in an art gallery:
...make this choice
...go for blouson softness and
show you know a lot about fashion art...
(Vogue Patterns, Spring 1978; p.8)
Secondly, garment poetics
connotes what Barthes calls the caritatism of the garment: the at once maternal and
infantile desire attached to the garment. It is signified by terms like 'lovely', 'small',
'warm', 'body-hugging1, etc.:
...exquisitely cut,
long-jacketed gabardine suits, above, caressing the waist on the way to the hip...
(Austr. Vogue, Oct. 1982; p.66)
In this connection Barthes also notes the role of
magic and fairy-tale connotations (robe-miracle,
robe-princesse):
...it's the new
pairing of the very pretty ruffled yoke Pierrot blouse and the ultra soft skirt of unpressed
pleats that works this magic...
(Vogue Patterns, Spring 1978; p.17)
31 Aust. J. Cultural Studies I: May 83
Thirdly, the fashion descriptions
continually emphasize the importance of the detail which 'can make all the difference', which
'can change all' — and which, of course, makes it possible to combine an 'aristocracy of taste with a
'democracy of budget' (SM,
p.24):
...All-important now: the hat...
(Austr. Vogue, Oct. 1982; p.70)
The logic of fashion
The relation between
the fashion description and the fashion meaning is, as we have seen, one of equivalence, a relation
which could be expressed by the term 'signify'. But it usually isn't. It usually is expressed
rhetorically, for it, too, must be rationalized or naturalized, so that the relation of arbitrary
equivalence which is the hallmark
of the sign, will be disguised as a different kind of relation, one of
transitivity, or one of finality, or one of causality. Instead pf 'accessories
signify spring', the fashion writer writes "accessories make spring";
instead of 'short
dresses signify fashion this year', she writes 'the dresses are short':
...Artful softness gives this
separates mood the look of a very important 78 dress,..
(Vogue Patterns, Spring 1978; p.17)
...double-hooded coats, left,
pannier jackets, cocoon coats, diamond-cut coats in silk matelasse and a slash of
bright taffeta, above, for evening. Surplices tailored for the combat of modern
life...
(Austr. Vogue, Oct. 1982; p.68)
In type B fashion statements the
arbitrariness of fashion is less disguised. But here the fashion imperative is, more often
than not, made innocent by playful phrasing and humour, as in this fashion statement,
which accompanies a photo in which the model poses as a scriptgirl:
...follow Vogue's fashion
script for the look at the top that works best, on or off camera...
(Vogue Patterns, Spring 1978; p.7)
At other times the dictate of
fashion is stated as a fact of nature, pure and simple, as a fatal and inevitable force:
...the fashion status of the
blazer grows and grows...
(Vogue Patterns, Spring 1978; p.14)
The world of fashion
Type A fashion statements, by
virtue of their rhetorical expression, embody ideological concepts. But, rather than
discursively, these concepts are signified by means of scenes, concrete situations, just as happens in literature.
They are particularized and naturalized:
32 Aust. J. Cultural Studies I: May 83
...Arrival
at the Peninsula Hotel: long jersey dress with deep slash at the side...
(Austr. Vogue, June
1977; p.80)
A dress solely for a
particular glamourous arrival in Hong Kong. A mythical and
"irrealized" function — but also a 'realistic' and naturalized mode
of signifying glamour:
...the
more mythical the function (because of its luxury of contingency), the more
the sign becomes masked; the more irrealized the fashion, the more apparently
empirical the sign (...) fashion writing thus returns to the postulate of a
realist style, according to which an accumulation of small and precise details
confirms the truth of the thing represented...
(SM, p.268)
The
metaphor and parataxis are the means by which this particularization is achieved:
the metaphor transforms a concept imbued with (already-known) cultural values
('the country') into a situation ('visit to the farm'); parataxis provides the narrative
element, the scene. Structure masked as an event.
Of course, fashion
texts have little temporal structure, little plot. They provide us
mainly with characters and situations. But if one puts two and two together,
one can construct, from a large body of fashion texts, the imaginary world of fashion.
The times of fashion, for example: fashion has its own seasons, in which holidays
and spring have a prominent place, because:
...spring
is at once a pure and a mythical season, pure because no other meaning is
attached to it (summer fashion is also holiday fashion, winter fashion also work
fashion), mythical because of the reawakening of nature...
(SM,
p.253)
The
fashion week is, of course, dominated by the distinction between week
and weekend, while the fashion day is marked by a change of dress at 9
am, noon,
4 pm, 8 pm, and midnight.
Or the places of
fashion — in which travelling plays a very dominant role: fashion
always refers to a 'utopic elsewhere'.
Or activities:
...the rhetoric of
fashion acts as a stimulant aiming at protecting the pleasure of activities
and at stripping these of their negative aspects. Shopping is no longer
impossible, expensive, tiring: it becomes an experience, a pure sensation
of pleasure in which a feeling of unlimited spending power goes hand in
hand with the promise of beauty, the pleasure of city life, and the joy of a form
of hyper-activity indulged in amidst utter emptiness...
(SM,
p.255)
Occupations
are rarely mentioned in fashion writing, and if they are, they are selected
from a rather small number (direction secretaries, librarians, professions concerned
with travelling) and treated as a state of being rather than as an activity.
Direction secretaries do not make telephone calls, do not type letters, etc.,
33 Aust. J. Cultural Studies I: May 83
but typically stand
close to the (half open) door of the young director's room. They are not engaged in an
activity, but are depicted as women with access to, and a devotion for the
young director. A static scene, a daydream. Work, in the world of fashion, is
empty and passive. Leisure time, on the other hand, is filled with activity: even doing nothing
becomes a project.
Personality traits are more
common than occupations: wild, frivolous, feminine, liberated, sexy, happy, romantic, chic,
adventurous, delicate, sophisticated, extravagant... the list is endless. Why does
Barthes call them 'personality traits' and not, for example, 'moods'? Because, as he
puts it, the psychology of fashion consists of adjectives, but it confuses the subject
with the predicate, and turns predicate into subject, much as is also the case in the psychology of
the horoscope and of elementary graphology. It
is a kind of psychology which lends itself
easily to pseudo-scientific classifications (type a: sporty; type b:
avant-garde; type c: classic, etc.)
(SM, p.257).
Often an item of clothing is
presented as suitable for every time of the day and the year, every place in
the world, every activity:
...these
marvellous airy things look beachy when you're at a pool or seaside, become
casually tailored or even dressy as the sun goes down...
(Woman's Day, 5/4/77; p. 100)
Clothes for all purposes, all times and places: one would
think they would only be found among the very poor. But in today's mass
culture they have acquired a new
signification: the promise of total confidence, of being able to handle every possible kind of situation, all of life, without
insecurity, without anxiety.
A similar hankering for that lost totality in which
one can be everything at once and in which all contradictions are resolved, all
differences erased, is behind the many
paradoxes we find in fashion meanings: practical, yet sophisticated; classical, yet imaginative; stylish, yet casual;
sporty, yet well dressed:
...pintucked
jersey dress with off the shoulder styling and jersey dress with satin
trim: the look — dramatic simplicity...
(Mode, Winter 1977; p.17)
And behind the promise of the uniqueness
of each individual, the promise of identity:
...it's all you...
(Mode, Winter 1977, p.17)
In this way the 'Woman of Fashion'
emerges from the pages of the fashion magazine — her days, her places, her activities, her
personality, her desire:
...this is Woman, as she is signified by the rhetoric of fashion:
decidedly feminine, definitely young, with a strong identity,
yet also with a contradictory personality. Her name is Daisy or
Barbara, and she frequently visits the Countess Mun and Miss Phips who has a
ranch in Florida. She is a direction secretary, but her
work never prevents her from attending all the parties of
34 Aust. J. Cultural Studies I: May 83
the day and the year. Every weekend she goes to the country, and she
travels continuously, to Capri, to the Canary Islands, to
Tahiti...yet every holiday she also manages to have a marvellous time in the
South of France. She moves exclusively in progressive,
liberated, avant-garde circles, and loves everything, from
Pascal to cool jazz...
(SM,
p.263)
And Barthes continues:
...one recognizes of course in this monster the permanent compromise
which characterizes the relation between mass culture and its consumers; the
Woman of Fashion is both what the reader of the fashion magazine is and what
she aspires to be (...) fashion participates in a very fundamental way in the
life of mass culture, because of the way in which it is steeped in rhetoric...
(SM,
p.263)
The
literature of fashion speaks the language of an over-protective mother who wants
to shield her daughter from every disappointment, from all contact with evil.
Unlike other products of the mass media (films, newspapers, popular novels), the literature
of fashion tells of a world of constant euphoria, a world in which nothing
dramatic ever happens. It is a radically irresponsible and disloyal world in
which every day erases the memory of yesterday, and in which the past is continuously
murdered without so much as a trace of guilt.
Theo Van Leeuwin teaches in the School of
English and Linguistics, Macquarie University.
REFERENCES
Barthes, R. (1967) Système
de la Mode (Paris, Editions du Seuil)
(1971a) 'Reponses', in Tel Quel, vol.47, pp.88-107
(1971b) 'Changer I'objet lui-meme', in Esprit, vol.402,
pp.613-616.
Calvet, L.-J. (1973) Roland Barthes — un
regard politique sur le signe (Paris, Payot)
Culler, J. (1975) Structuralist Poetics (London, Routledge and
Kegan Paul)
Pages, J.-B. (1979) Comprendre Roland Barthes
(Toulouse, Pensee Privat)
Gaillard, F. (1974) 'Roland Barthes
'semioclaste'?', in L'Arc, vol.56, pp.17-24.
Kristeva, J. (1969) 'Le sens et la mode' in Kristeva Enreiwtiky
Recherches pour un Semanaiyse (Paris,
Editions de Seuil), pp.60-89.
Thody, P. (1977) Roland Barthes - a conservative estimate (London,
Macmillan) Van Poecke, L. (1978) De Taal
van de Kledij (Louvain, Cecowe)
Illustrations by kind permission of Bernard
Leser Publications: Copyright Bernard Leser Publications Pty Ltd.
35 Aust. J. Cultural Studies I: May 83