Читать книгу Dress as Metaphor British Female Fashion and Social Change in the 20th Century - Katarzyna Kociolek - Страница 17

There exist two main approaches to the study of meanings in fashion. Firstly, the study of fashion has its roots in arts history, whose branch ‘iconology’ interprets visual metaphors used in the fine arts (described later in this chapter based on the work by Anne Hollander). Secondly, theories of fashion are embedded in the linguistic discipline of semiotics, the approach that was initiated by Roland Barthes and continued by Umberto Eco. So far these two approaches have not overlapped, although they seem to share a common denominator – the concept of a metaphor as central to the production and reception of meanings through fashion. As noted by María J. Ortiz, following the confirmation of a hypothesis that “metaphors can be expressed visually” and that “metaphor is a valid unit of analysis of a non-verbal corpus” (1579), I intend to re-examine the conceptualisation of female fashion by theorists of fashion. By applying elements of Conceptual Metaphor Theory, I trace visual manifestation of primary metaphors in female fashion in selected periods in the 20th century, demonstrating how changing fashions reflected changing cultural and social values and femininity ideals. In the present analysis of fashion I refer to Grady’s Primary Metaphor Theory (1997), which establishes the concept of primary metaphors as “characterized by their universality and by their being based on sensory-motor experiences” (Ortiz 1579). They are the starting point for a fashion analysis; and based on photographs, adverts and cartoons I demonstrate that primary metaphors are present in items of clothing and that fashion, as Ortiz puts it, also “metaphorically conceptualises notions like evil, importance, control, union or confusion” (Ortiz 1579). Since Kövecses (2005) lists both cartoons and advertisements among non-linguistic realisations of metaphors, the primary sources that I examine fall into two major categories: monomodal and multimodal metaphors, with photographs representing the latter while cartoons, which combine image and written text, the former category. Wartime posters and advertisements from the two journals that I examine: Votes for Women and Spare Rib, frequently fall into either of the categories depending on their format.

Conceptual Metaphor Theory (CMT) is rapidly making its way into such diverse academic fields as political sciences, nursing, the visual arts, or archaeology. In fact, it seems that archaeology with its study of material metaphors ←43 | 44→comes closest to the use of CMT in relation to sartorial practices, as archelogy like fashion history and theory boasts a long tradition of studying identity through artefacts. For example, Rob Wiseman from University College London in his article entitled “Social Distance in Hunter-Gather Settlement Sites: A Conceptual Metaphor in Material Culture” applies CMT in his archaeological analysis, observing, that applying theories of embedded cognition to material culture and examining “material metaphors” (130) contributes to the expansion of the CMT propagated by such scholars as among others Charles Forceville. While Wiseman deploys CMT to explain settlement patterns, much of the paper is devoted to the discussion of the relationship between spatial and social relations. Citing examples of verbal metaphors which equate physical proximity between community members with their level of emotional attachment to one another, the author notes that settlement arrangements metaphorically reflected psychological distance between group members. Another archaeology scholar Joanna Brück from University College Dublin examines “material metaphors” in her study of Bronze Age burial sites. In her article “Material metaphors. The relational construction of identity in Early Bronze Age burials in Ireland and Britain” (2004), Brück notes that burial goods and gifts, contrary to commonly held opinions were not a simple reflection of the buried person’s identity, but should rather be treated as metaphorical comments on relations that the deceased person had with the gift givers, “the objects placed in the grave allowed the mourners to comment metaphorically on the links between the dead and the living, as well as on the changes experienced by a community torn asunder by death” (311). Concluding her analysis with a statement that burial objects “constituted part of the person” and that “the boundaries of the self did not coincide neatly with the limits of the physical body, but incorporated elements ‘outside’ of it” (325), Brück seems to view these artefacts as a special case of a metaphor.

Based on Lakoff and Johnson’s conceptualisation of metaphors and the metaphor paradigm, A is B repeatedly used in their seminal work on Conceptual Metaphor Theory, entitled Metaphors We Live By (1980), one may venture a statement that the same model as in for example “LOVE IS A JOURNEY” operates in the realm of fashion. While fashion has been frequently lauded as a tool for constructing and communicating identities (as it is demonstrated in Chapter 1), the exact mechanism through which this is possible has remained largely unexplored. Although some cognitivists have already examined metaphors in non-verbal expression (Metaphor and Thought, ed. Raymond W. Gibbs, Jr, CUP, Cambridge, 2008) for example John M. Kennedy in art, Alan Cienki and Cornelia Müller in gesture and thought (2008), or Lawrence M. Zbikowski in music, so far fashion, despite being a vital element of visual culture and visual ←44 | 45→communication, has been left out. Yet, it seems that Conceptual Metaphor Theory when combined with communication theories and visual culture theories seem to shed some more light on the signification process, which occurs in and through fashion.

Linguistic corpora examined by Lakoff and Johnson demonstrates that verbal metaphors reflect “physical and cultural experience” (19) and that spatialization tends to form the core of a metaphorical expression as is the case with the concept of “high status” (18). In fact, according Lakoff and Johnson, “experiential basis” explains the existence of such metaphors like MORE IS UP, LESS IS DOWN, RATIONAL IS UP, EMOTIONAL IS DOWN. Further in the text, I intend to examine to what extent these metaphors are also present in the visual code of fashion, which according to some scholars (e.g. Malcolm Barnard) is a form of a language. In other words, I attempt to answer the question to what extent garments and clothing are a visual realisation of these metaphors. For example, a top hat as worn in the past by respectable gentlemen seems to be a visual realisation of several metaphors such as STATUS IS UP, CONTROL IS UP, GOOD IS UP, as spatial relations are translated (rendered metaphorically, or mapped onto) the form of a hat, whose proportions stress its height (also evident in the name). Tailored garments on the other hand imply control, for they visually reflect the concept of causation and the metaphor described by Lakoff and Johnson as THE OBJECT COMES OUT OF THE SUBSTANCE. A tailored garment is the object that comes into being through DIRECT MANIPULATION (73) and can be viewed as a container for that material (fabric). One may argue, therefore, that the wearing of a tailored suit as opposed to wearing untailored clothing doubly connotes the notion of control: (a) control over the fabric, (b) control over the body, which when clad in such clothes (usually made to measure) seems to merely fill in the CONTAINER that is tailored clothes.

For the sake of clarity and following Lakoff and Johnson, I propose to view metaphors as “the key to giving an adequate account of understanding” (1980, ix) and fashion as embedded in and deriving from “the most fundamental values in a culture” (22). While as noted by Lakoff and Johnson, language metaphors reflect cultural values, I want to stipulate that so do other forms of communication including fashion. In fact, many fashion historians and theorists have pointed to a correlation between sartorial practices and forms of social organisation, for example in feudal societies, or as practiced by members of subcultures (Dick Hebdige’s notion of homology might in fact be viewed as linked to Conceptual Metaphor Theory). However, what these accounts seem to lack is a more accurate methodological approach to the mechanism through which a garment or an attire evoke connotations which are sufficiently specific to be satisfactory for the ←45 | 46→identity-constructing wearer and “readable” for the viewer. Fashion historians, have largely shunned from examining the signification process of dress, concentrating on describing historical alterations in clothing, while semioticians such as Barthes focused on the language of fashion instead.

Applying the A is B model to clothing, firstly one may observe that in Western societies, including Britain, up to the mid-20th century items of clothing were used to convey clear-cut boundaries between gender identities. And so, until the sexual revolution of the 1960s, the following statements seemed to be largely true for mainstream society: SKIRT IS FEMININITY, TROUSERS ARE MASCULINITY. As observed by Elizabeth Wilson “trousers were (…) respectable wear for women only on the beach, on the sports field or for leisure until well after the Second World War” (164) and even in the late 20th century on formal occasions in business and banking “women may not wear trousers,” (165) she adds. Interestingly, while the latter in its basic form, without any qualification, is no longer valid, the former, and is only subverted in the process of a marginal social practice of gender cross-dressing (deliberately omitted in the book, for it informs the study of masculinity rather than femininity). Among other issues, the questions that I intend to explore in the current study are what types of skirts or trousers connoted what types of feminine identities, as well as which garment combinations strengthened and which subdued specific modes of femininity, and why.

Browsing through photographs of historical costumes and paintings which illustrate fashions of the past centuries, it is hard to resist a statement that in given periods in history fashion of the elite reflected the elite value systems. While some of these values have prevailed well into the contemporary times, some others have been modified or marginalised. Lakoff and Johnson’s analysis of orientational metaphors, which “have to do with spatial orientation” and “have a basis in our physical and cultural experience” (14) allows us to better comprehend how inherent qualities of the items of clothing communicate social values. For example, until the 19th century in menswear and until the 20th century in womenswear, fashion seemed to have reflected the cultural value described by Lakoff and Johnson as “MORE IS BETTER”. Excessive ornamentation, decoration, and exuberance of fabrics used for creation of attire of those in position of power were also expressive of and coherent with other spatialization metaphors proposed by Lakoff and Johnson, namely “MORE IS UP and GOOD IS UP”.

The link that the authors propose between the concept of UP and social status as well as power and virtue, noting that “status is correlated with (social) power and (physical) power is UP” (16), “VIRTUE IS UP because actions correlate with social well-being” (17), seems to shed some more light on the introduction of ←46 | 47→and the centuries-long appeal of corsets, crinolines, busks and all sorts of padding sewn into the garments. (In fact, the cultural value GOOD IS UP seems to have prevailed into the 21st century, with the fashion for lifting of various body parts being expressed in underwear, footwear and cosmetics). Lakoff and Johnson also argue that being in control is correlated with virtue. Therefore, clothing that controlled the body, such as corsets, seemed to metaphorically convey not only status and power, for they lifted the breasts UP, but also being in control as they shaped/controlled/limited the waist. Being in control is in turn linked to being rational, “CONTROL IS UP thus provides a basis for MAN IS UP and therefore for RATIONAL IS UP” (17). It seems that relating a corset to these metaphor models allow us to account for its ambiguous meaning as a garment enhancing female sexuality on the one hand and a metaphor of female virtue and supreme status on the other (tight lacing equals excessive control over the body, to the extent that the supposedly rigid bone structure is interfered with and internal organs misplaced).

Rejecting both objectivist and subjectivist theories of human understanding, Lakoff and Johnson regard metaphor as “an experientialist synthesis,” which “unites reason and imagination” (192–193). According to the scholars, metaphor is a device which breaches the division between objectivism and subjectivism and connects rationality with imagination. Therefore, it proves particularly useful as a tool “for trying to comprehend partially what cannot be comprehended totally: our feelings, aesthetic experiences, moral practices, and spiritual awareness” (193). Since fashion operates across these areas – reflecting feelings, moral practices, and spiritual awareness, as well as being a source of aesthetic experience, garments and attire, especially those assembled for a public gaze, may be treated as visual metaphors. Following Conceptual Metaphor theorists, I consider metaphors to be “conceptual in nature” and to belong among “principal vehicles for understanding” (159). Consequently, like Lakoff and Johnson, I hold the view that their relevance far exceeds the domain of linguistics, for they seem to “play a central role in the construction of social and political reality” (159). Although, undoubtedly textual metaphors are widely used in political and social discourses, becoming the main area of academic analysis, in this work I intend to shed some more light on the use of metaphor in non-verbal expressions, treating dress and clothing as an example of such expressions.

Also the Conceptual Blending Theory as proposed by Gilles Fauconnier and Mark Turner in their ground-breaking work The Way We Think (2002), seems to offer a viable tool for the analysis of fashion as a cultural phenomenon that is linked to concepts of identity. While the theory accounts for a largely obscure operation of the human mind, it can be traced in the texts of culture ranging ←47 | 48→from literature to scientific inventions. In fact, according to the authors, it is conceptual blending that lies at the foundation of creativity and all human actions, including design, “conceptual blending underlies and makes possible all these diverse human accomplishments, (…) it is responsible for the origins of language, art, religion, science (…) it is as indispensable for basic everyday thought as it is for artistic and scientific abilities” (vi). While humans are preoccupied with forms such as music or art, these forms are characterised by their complexity because human beings “have the most effective abilities for the construction of meaning” (5). One of the products of these largely unconscious operations of the mind in relation to form, which manifest themselves in the ability to recognise sameness and difference, is identity. Because fashion is frequently conceptualised in terms of its ability to construct and subvert identities, in the following paragraphs I attempt to apply conceptual blending theory to explain how identities may be constructed through clothing.

Indeed, the initial example of form provided by Fauconnier and Turner appears related to the notion of dress. While observing that Achilles’ armour tricked Trojans into believing that they saw real Achilles, the scholars note that in the 21st century we seem to attach undue importance to form and that “like the Trojans, we (…) have come to realize that the miracles of form harness the unconscious and usually invisible powers of human beings to construct meaning” (5). Unsurprisingly then, clothing is often regarded as pivotal in the construction of identities. As “form prompts meanings and must be suited to its tasks” (5), we may view dress as being the form analogous to armour, which explains the importance of appropriate dress in public/political space. According to Fauconnier and Turner, Conceptual Blending Theory, which allows us to understand “the stability of character across different activities” (251) explains the mechanism through which humans establish a connection between a person and his/her actions. By introducing the concept of “frames”, which seems to correspond to social contexts and situations but also social roles, the authors claim that it is through frames that generalisations about the character can be made, “Frames and characters are interlocking aspects of human reality” (253). Giving examples of such frames as “saint, diplomat, hooker, mediator”, Fauconnier and Turner, argue however that each of these may be “construed as a frame that anybody can fall into, or as a frame with character implications” (253). When relating the concepts of frames and characters to dress styles, one may discover that clothing accompanies the construction of frames and therefore “converges on the understanding of character” (252).

Using Conceptual Blending Theory allows to grasp the mechanism of meaning construction trough clothing also thanks to the notion of compression that helps ←48 | 49→bring abstract phenomenon and concepts to a human scale. Compressions allow to achieve human scale by (a) compressing what is diffuse, (b) going from Many to One, (c) obtaining global insights, (d) strengthening vital relations, (e) coming up with a story. It is also compression that initiates metaphor. In a process of communication through dress, it appears that abstract concepts, or frames are either mapped onto clothing (Conceptual Metaphor Theory) or if there are more than one input space these are seen to be interconnected (blended) giving rise to a new blended space in which a specific attire embodies some abstract concepts such as hierarchy, status, gender, cultural values. Likewise, it is the notion of compression which allows viewers to make sense of several media representations of a person or phenomenon. And so, it is due to compression that one may interpret a cartoon representation of a suffragette as Mrs Arson to be standing for all the suffragettes, or in another cartoon (discussed at length in Chapter 3) the series of drawing of differently looking women as an evolution of a suffragette’s face. In all the examined in the book instances when 20th-century female fashion seemed to relate to social changes regarding the position of women in British society, the connection between specific sartorial practices and the meaning of attire or garments becomes apparent with the application of Conceptual Metaphor Theory or Conceptual Blending Theory. What justifies the examination of how dress styles were turned into blends or metaphors, which effectively communicated novel ideas about femininity is the relative importance attached to clothing by suffragettes, feminists or female political figures. Therefore, it seems essential to examine not only the visual representation of female sartorial practices but also all those written accounts that testify to the relevance of clothes for female identities, which can be found in suffragettes’ and feminists’ magazines and women’s biographies and autobiographies.

The meanings as produced by and inferred from clothing seem to be related to what the blending theory terms “vital relations” (Fauconnier and Turner 2002). These are “conceptual relations” which predominate in the cognitive processes of blending and compression and which include “Change, Identity, Time, Space, Cause-Effect, Part-Whole, Representation, Role, Analogy, Disanalogy, Property, Similarity, Category, Intentionality, Uniqueness” (101). As in the current study, photographs are examined to comment on the connection between clothes and femininity the relations of identity and representation seem to be particularly important. Giving an example of a painting of the queen, the authors note that “the representation link between the thing represented and the thing representing it is typically compressed into uniqueness” (97). Similarly, Fauconnier and Turner argue that the photograph of a person’s face becomes meaningful through “an automatic blending network in which a person is linked ←49 | 50→to her body” based on a “neurobiological fact” that “there is a systematic one-to-one mapping between bodies and faces” (97–98). Clothing, which is linked to the body seems involved in such vital relations as Part-Whole (e.g. advertisement for a white blouse that connotes suffragettes and their specific dress code), Cause-Effect (as in the cartoon which depicts the effects of being a suffragette on sartorial practices of a young woman, who gradually becomes less attractive), or Identity, “a powerful and supple instrument for creating and disintegrating identity” (95), which allows to conceptually combine several images of the same person (as in the collection of photographs in Boothroyd’s autobiography).

According to Joseph Grady, “Blending theory does acknowledge metaphors as a particular kind of conceptualization, and refers explicitly to ‘metaphoric counterpart connections’ ” (Grady 1595–1614). While blending theory has been described as a “theory of online meaning construction” (Coulson and Oakley, 2000: 175), and “blenders” have tended to focus attention on the (theoretically) real-time processes which allow a particular conceptualisation to arise and to be comprehensible, the theory explicitly acknowledges the role of stored patterns as necessary materials for conceptual integration (Grady 1598). The above fragment conveys how meanings are constructed and conveyed by clothing. While individual garments produce specific “conceptualizations”, through reference to these “stored patterns” of styles past and present, which are endlessly used and re-used in visual culture texts from works of art to advertising, a viewer is capable of “conceptual integration”. Following Lakoff and Johnson, Grady observes that the meaning of primary metaphors relies on “experiential correlation” (1600), and that their connection to physical experience makes primary metaphors a universal and “cross-linguistic” (1600) phenomenon. He expands earlier theories of conceptual metaphors by trying to systematize cognitive processes which allow for such correlations. Among those underlying most of primary metaphors such as MORE IS UP, Grady lists “causation” and “instantation (…) Generic is Specific” (1601). Using causation as the underlying relation when interpreting the metaphorical meaning of clothing might help explain why, for example, clothes that are covering most of the body parts are in many cultures viewed as modest and respectful, while their wearers might occasionally be regarded as reserved. In contrast, garments that are more revealing (in cultures which allow them) tend to connote openness and readiness for relationships – more clothing causes the sense of greater barrier between the wearer and the viewer (the surrounding). Obviously such a reading of attire would not be possible without reference to the above-mentioned notion of “stored patterns” of styles, thanks to which the viewer is also aware of contexts in which skimpy dress might be worn – for example holiday resort, and can produce more correlations ←50 | 51→for example playfulness, gaiety, frivolity, linking them conceptually with leisure activities. These in turn might be mapped onto the wearer’s personality. Consequently, in Western cultures, in many contexts more clothing connotes seriousness and a serious-minded person. In recognition of such metaphorical meaning of attire, the grander the occasion the more items of clothing are required, which is currently most evident in formal menswear, demanding layers of clothes to be worn even in hot weather. Such practice can also be found in corporate women’s dress codes, which usually require that women wear tights regardless of the weather. As transparent tights are usually acceptable, the garment seems to be but a metaphor of a piece of clothing that “covers” and there seems to be a causation relation between the act of wearing such tights and a projected concept of a covered body equalling respectful body.

Dress as a conceptual, non-linguistic metaphor seems to reflect social divisions, with different social groups expressing such meanings as elegance, through different sartorial arrangements, “we should expect metaphors, both of the conceptual and of the linguistic kind, to vary according to these social divisions” (Kövecses 2005, 88). While, as Kövecses observes, linguistic metaphors reflect gender, regional and class divisions, the same can be said about dress. For example, members of different social classes will use different clothing to metaphorically indicate their class affiliation, or levels of formality. Although such differences are economically based, they are also indicative of specific tastes into which the group members are socialised (McRobbie 1998, 12). Moreover, like in linguistic metaphors, also in sartorial metaphors, gender differences are variously expressed across social classes, with the lower classes having a stronger tendency to sartorially accentuate gender through styles that enhance sexuality, for example low cut tops, tight-fitted clothing (McRobbie 1998, 28).

Referring to George Lakoff (1993), Kövecses presents examples of metaphors that are found outside language and calls them “non-linguistic realisations of conceptual metaphors” (Kövecses and Benczes, 2010, 63). Numerous instances of such metaphors, he argues, can be found in films and acting, where either the whole narrative or individual scenes are based on a primary metaphor, for example LIFE IS A JOURNEY. Yet, other texts of culture such as sculpture, cartoons or architecture are also loaded with metaphors. For example, the metaphor SIGNIFICANT IS BIG, notes Kövecses, finds its realisation in architecture as well as in monumental sculptures. Not only material culture is replete with metaphors, also political discourses and morality are structured around conceptual metaphors, which relate to notions of strength, weakness, being good or bad, as in “being good is being upright, being bad is being low, doing evil is falling, evil is a force, morality is strength” (69). Another commonly operating metaphor ←51 | 52→QUALITY IS QUANTITY underlies schools’ grading systems, with alphabetical grades having their numerical equivalents. Thanks to rapid developments in Conceptual Metaphor Theory particularly, the insightful research of Charles Foceville and Alan Cienki on non-verbal metaphors, metaphors are currently regarded and “be[ing] manifested in (…) pictures, sound, music, and gesture, and perhaps even smell, touch, and taste” (72), notes Kövecses. Because, as Kövecses concludes, “conceptual metaphor pervades much of our social, artistic, psychological, intellectual and cultural life” (73), it seems somewhat surprising that so far CMT has not been applied to the study of fashion and the interpretation of meanings produced by clothing. The aim of the current study is to at least partially fill this void, and to trace primary metaphors realised in female clothing in 20th century Britain.

According to Kövecses, metaphors exceed the realm of language and cognition, for they can be amply found in the physical world of cultural practices, “When I say that a conceptual domain “turns into” social–physical reality, I simply mean that the conceptual domain occurs not only as a concept or as a word but also as a more or less tangible thing or process in our social and cultural practice (i.e., as a social and physical object, institution, action, activity, event, state, relationship, and the like)” (Kövecses 2005, 164). Although fashion is not included among the cultural practices mentioned above, it seems that sartorial practices are constituent of actions, events, and states. Also, clothes form part of what Kövecses calls the life as a show or spectacle metaphor, which dominates for example in American culture. According to Kövecses (2005, 184), this is a “foundational metaphor” that organises vast areas of cultural practices, dating back to Shakespearian conceptualisation of life as theatrical performance. The linguistic evidence proves that the theatre vocabulary is commonly used to metaphorically relate to various life experiences, while closer analysis of such metaphors proves that they are based on several mappings such as: a person leading a life is an actor, the beginning of the play is his/her birth, the end of the play is his/her death, while parts are the person’s roles in life. Such conceptualisation of life became dominant in the USA in the 20th century, when consumerism and entertainment industry started to govern social and cultural life. In the process the old puritan values of courage and hard work embraced by earlier “character culture” gave way to likeability, personal charm, and ability to perform that loom large over the new “personality culture” (186). Yet, if it is assumed that life is a performance then clothes should be regarded as costumes that help to convincingly play the parts, can be put on and discarded when necessary, but most importantly serve as a code that assists actors in communicating their message. While Kövecses convincingly argues ←52 | 53→that the show metaphor dominates in American politics as well as daily activities, he does not extend the metaphor to discuss sartorial practices and fails to account for the importance of clothing as costumes in these performances. The implication of adding a new mapping which is clothes are costumes to life is a show metaphor, aids the perception that actors consciously select dress to enhance their public performance. This in turn effectively minimises the problem of unpredictability and randomness of fashion that in the past precluded the possibility of a more systematic analysis of meanings expressed in and through clothing.