Course Foundations Clothing & Society Spring 2014
Schedule • Attendance • Address Syllabus, Course, Schedule Questions • Begin Lecture #1: Course Foundations • Break • Tyler & Mus Discussion Leadership #1 • “I Assume” Activity • Prep for Thursday 2/13/14
How to View this Course
SOCIAL JUSTICE MODEL: Race, Class, Gender, Sexual Identity, Looks, Size, Ability, Age, & Religion
CLOTHING & SOCIETY
APPEARANCE MODEL: Clothing, Dress, Image, Impression, & Identity
We are here!
Social Construction • Is the process by which people creatively shape reality through social interaction.
Symbolic Interaction Theory • These meanings are handled in, and modified through, an interpretive process used by the person in dealing with the things he or she encounters (Blumer, 1969, p. 2).
• The mediation of meaning in social interaction is distinguished by a continually emerging processual nature (Charmaz, 1980, p. 25).
Connecting the Concepts
Social Construction
Symbolic Interaction Theory
A First Date‌
The Thomas Theorem • Named for W.I. Thomas (1933)
• Also called “definition of the situation”
• Situations that are defined as real are real in their consequences – How do we know what we are doing, while we are doing it?
Roles • Definition • Ascribed Role • Achieved Role • Dramaturgical Perspective – “All the world's a stage, And all the men and women merely players; They have their exits and their entrances, And one man in his time plays many parts…” 2, scene 7, 139–143).
(As You Like It Act
Role Performance:
The Presentation
of the Self
• Erving Goffman (1959) – The dramaturgical perspective – Impression Management/ Appearance Management – How do we perform roles? – Ask yourself, what different kinds of roles do you perform on a daily basis?
Appearance • “The total, composite image created by the human body and any modifications, embellishments, or coverings of the body that are visually perceived, a visual context that includes clothing as well as the body” (Kaiser, 1990, p. 4).
What does this mean?
Critical Social Science Lens • One of three major approaches to social research that emphasizes combating surface-level distortions, multiple levels of reality, and valuebased activism for human empowerment� (Neuman, 2006, p. 94).
Systems of Privilege & Oppression •
The “isms” •
Racism
•
Classism
•
Sexism
•
Heterosexism
•
Lookism
•
Fattism/Size Discrimination
•
Ageism/Adultism
•
Ableism/Ability Status
•
Religious Oppression
Manifestation • Social Construction • Social Institutions • Privilege & Oppression/Privilege
v. Oppression
• Intersectionality
Social Institutions • Organize Life in the United States • Create and define parameters by which we live • Work systematically because of intersecting systems
Economy Government Family Religion Media Education Military
Intersectionality • Intersectionality holds that the classical conceptualizations of oppression within society do not act independently of one another. • These forms of oppression interrelate, creating a system of oppression that reflects the "intersection" of multiple forms of discrimination. • A person can experience both privilege and oppression at the same time!
Intersectionality Continued‌ • How does one experience both privilege and oppression at the same time?
Social Location • 8 Categories Define Our Social Location – Sex/Gender – Race/Ethnicity/Citizenship – Age – Sexual Identity – Class – Looks/Size – Ability Status – Religion*