Tag Archives: fashion

“America’s next top sociologist”?

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I highlighted this story recently and now Salon.com has a longer piece about the research of sociology Ph.D. student Ashley Mears provocatively titled “America’s Next Top Sociologist.”

When I first saw this headline, I thought perhaps it was a piece about identifying an up and coming sociologist, not a play on the title of the TV show America’s Next Top Model. If sociologists were asked about who the next top sociologists are, what would they say?

Additionally, do sociologists think that the current system, made up of universities and colleges, foundations, government agencies, and some other actors, help promising sociologists rise to the top or is it more oriented toward letting those at the top serve as tough gatekeepers?

A sociology PhD student is studying changing women’s clothing sizes while also not looking in the mirror before her wedding

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This story has now been going around for a few days: a bride-to-be decided 6 months before her wedding to not look at herself in the mirror for the next year, blog about the experience, and draw attention to how women think about beauty and their bodies. What perhaps has gotten lost in this story is that this is being undertaken by a sociology PhD student who is writing a dissertation about women’s clothing sizes:

When Kjerstin Gruys got engaged to her longtime boyfriend, the former fashion merchandiser turned sociologist feared she would relapse into an eating disorder as she hunted for the perfect wedding dress. She was fiercely committed to researching her sociology Ph.D. on beauty and inequality, but was overwhelmed by the pressure of having a picturesque wedding. Her values and behavior were at odds, and she knew had to do something — and quick.

Instead of becoming engulfed in a vanity obsession, she committed to a year without mirrors — and launched the blog Mirror Mirror…OFF The Wall six months before her wedding date…

For her Ph.D. research, Gruys has moved on from body image and started examining vanity size — when clothing that was once, say, a size 8, becomes a size 6 so that women feel better about themselves, she said. By analyzing Sears catalogs from the past 100 years, Gruys said she’s seen drastic changes in clothing size over time. “I think the most interesting thing I’ve found so far is simply that clothing sizes have changed so dramatically, especially for women, and in the direction of getting away from having the clothing size and clothing measurements having any relationship to each other.”

“When we think of standards we think of things that make our lives more standard and more efficient,” she said. But clothing size standards are different across every fashion firm and even across brands within a firm. “We attach so much emotion to body size, women especially and companies want us to feel good when we are trying on their clothes.”

Both projects sound interesting and studying women’s clothing sizes from a sociology of culture perspective is something I wrote about recently.

It is also intriguing to think how this PhD candidate is mixing more traditional forms of research with blogging. This particular mirrors project is not simply being undertaken by someone like AJ Jacobs, a writer who has tackled some odd activities and then written about them (my favorite: The Year of Living Biblically). Rather, this is an academic who has a background in fashion who is also researching topics in the same subfield. The blog could function as more of a personal outlet but I assume it would be informed by sociological insights. I suspect we will see more of this in the future as academics would benefit quite a bit from blog side projects that draw attention to noteworthy issues as well as highlight their research.

A final thought: what would be an equivalent project that a man could undertake?

Linking the history of women’s clothing size and the sociology of culture

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This article about women’s clothing sizes reminds me of the production approach within the sociology of culture: sizes were once regulated more closely.

This lack of sizing standards wasn’t always the case.

Until January 20, 1983, the U.S. Department of Commerce and the National Institute of Standards and Technology offered specifics for the sizing of apparel with body measurements for men, women, junior women, young men and children. These standards began in the late 1940s as a byproduct of the necessity for size-standardization in military uniforms during World War Two. Committees that included textile manufacturers, designers and retailers worked with the Department of Agriculture to determine these sizing standards and all adhered to it.

The program was discontinued in 1983. The measurements were not keeping up with the typical American body, which was changing due to better medicine and nutrition, along with an influx of new and varied ethnic groups. Sponsorship of these standards was assumed by private industry. That marked the start of sizing’s new Wild West, a lawless, volatile environment that continues today.

As the production approach would suggest, sizes were once standardized because of particular historical circumstances, namely, World War II. Once the regulation was deemed “unnecessary,” different companies took the sizes in completely different directions. The defense of the change given in the article, new bodies and types, doesn’t make much sense: the existing standards could have simply been altered rather than abandoned.

It would be interesting to see more on how the marketing and design of women’s clothes changed with the regulatory shift. Prior to 1983, companies couldn’t really play around with size and use it as a distinguishing feature. After 1983, different brands could use this as part of their image and sales pitch. Did brands that deviated a lot from the prior standards really help their cause?

Fighting “cultural addiction to shoes”

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A professor from Liberty is on a “crusade to challenge America’s cultural addiction to shoes.”

The barefoot movement is gaining attention, particularly among runners who say it is more natural to run barefoot.

I would be curious to know what kind of conversations this professor has with people in public. He is breaking a basic social norm that most people wouldn’t think twice about.

Another question: are stories like these generally positive for professors?

Differences in fashion tastes across American cities

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The Wall Street Journal reports on fashion differences across large American cities. The findings are based on the analysis of luxury spending by several different retailers. Some of the findings:

Southerners bought more white, green, and pink than other regions’ residents, for instance, according to data from private-sale site Hautelook.com, which caters to young, urban professional women…

Though Dallas has a flashy, big-spending image, the average woman there spends less on fashion than one in notoriously frumpy Washington, D.C., according to fashion website ShopItToMe.com…

And despite the fashion press’s obsession with J. Crew, the company is among the top five brands only in New York City and Boston…

So while there are national media outlets and national retail stores that promote their own tastes and lines, there are also regional tastes that shoppers follow. Who sets these regional tastes? Who or what, for example, helps shoppers make decisions in places like Detroit and St. Louis so that their fashion tastes differ from New York or Chicago? Local culture plays some role but how does it translate into fashion choices?