Fragments of a Fashionable Discourse

One of Kaja Silverman's main idea is that of the “male identification with woman-as-spectacle”. This idea is prevalent in the modeling industry today. Although there are male models, when most people think of the concept of a model, they usually associate it with a woman. With runway shows, it is predominantly women who put on the clothes, shoes, and makeup and walk down the runway essentially as a spectacle for the audience to see. Modeling in photos is the same. The photos are taken, usually of women with their hair and makeup done, and put in magazines as advertisements. This advertisement business is the epitome of the “woman-as-spectacle” idea in that the audience is such a wide range of people who just look at the woman and are persuaded to buy something. The audience doesn't see the woman as a real person with a personality and background, but instead just as a spectacle.

Silverman makes another thought-provoking argument in comparing clothing to an envelope that is necessary to articulate the body and thus psyche. To support this, she calls upon Freud's work, which describes the ego as "a mental projection of the surface of the body.” This idea is the fundamental basis of how people choose what clothes they wear. Their clothing often reflects their personality or or how they're feeling. Some people tend to wear brighter colors when they feel happier, or on the other hand throw anything together when they're rushed, possibly indicating stress. The style of clothing people choose also reflects how they see themselves. For example, when students here wear a USC shirt or sweatshirt, they show that they see themselves as part of the USC community and especially on football game days, it shows who they are rooting for and their pride for their school.

Silverman progresses this argument well in saying that clothes create “rudimentary distinctions between self and other” In most TV shows and movies, when a female character sees another person wearing the same thing that she is, it usually creates a conflict. The female character essentially sees her clothes as defining her identity, so when she sees another person wearing the same outfit, she shocked at the loss of the uniqueness of her identity. One of the many examples of this happens in the show I Love Lucy. There is one episode where Lucy and Ethel wear the same fancy dress. They look at each other in shock and one of them says, “I thought you were going to take yours back!” Conflict then ensues as they tear apart each other's dresses. Looking at situations like this makes it seem like there is almost too much at stake with fashion.