Fashion, Gender and Social Identity

Zoi Arvanitidou and Dr Maria Gasouka

Garment and fashion is the subject of intense sociological, historical, anthropological and semiotic analysis in contemporary social theory. The phenomenon of fashion, the impact of which is recognized by the famous cliché “You are what you wear”, offers a dense, rich set of costume options and reveals multiple and unexpected ways through which fashion is part of the concrete, tangible, profound, complicated and symbolic process of forming of the modern and postmodern Self, identity, body and social relations.

The development of gender identity is a social construct with garment and fashion being two factors of this configuration. Even fashion should be considered as part of the social processes of discrimination, namely the reproduction of hierarchy’s position and prestige in a deeply unequal society.

The aim of this study is to detect different types of human ideas about the evolution of gender through clothing and fashion, what is “feminine” and “male” appearance in the evaluation of various dress styles.

The research part of this paper includes the results of a Qualitive social research. The theoretical framework of feminist theory and the process of semi-structured interview are chose in order to release the interviewees.