Fashion as an Institutionalized System: Japanese High Fashion and Street Fashion as Case Studies

June 16, 2010 6:30 PM (finished)


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Yuniya Kawamura, Ph.D.

(Associate Professor of Sociology at the Fashion Institute of Technology (F.I.T.)/State University of New York)

Date/Time June 16, 2010 6:30 PM
Location Room 549 5th floor, Akamon Sogo Kenkyuto Institute of Social Science, University of Tokyo  [map]
Abstract I treat fashion as an institutionalized system. This study is a macro-sociological analysis of the social organization of Japanese street fashion and a micro-interactionist analysis of teen consumers who form various subcultures which directly and indirectly dictate some of the latest fashion trends. It shows the interdependence in the production process of fashion between institutions within the industries and the Japanese teens. Street fashion in the fashionable districts of Tokyo, such as Harajuku and Shibuya, is independent of any mainstream fashion system and goes beyond the conventional model of fashion business with different marketing strategies and occupational categories that are increasingly becoming blurry. Fashion is no longer controlled or guided by professionally trained designers but by the teens who have become the producers of fashion. My work is influenced by Harrison White's study on the dealer-critic system in nineteenth century France and Howard Becker's work on art worlds that pays attention to individual networks within the art community. My current fieldwork on Japanese street fashion and subcultures is an extension of my previous research on high fashion focusing on Japanese outsider designers in the French fashion system. I compare and contrast these two systems, i.e. high fashion and street fashion, and investigate the process of making street fashion happen. I am interested in how fashion is formed/produced, sustained and reproduced. I also explore why some Japanese youths choose to dress in distinctive and outrageous styles, what these styles represent and symbolize, and how the youths communicate and interact with each other to become a member of a specific subculture.
Bio Yuniya (Yuni) Kawamura is the author of "The Japanese Revolution in Paris Fashion" (Berg 2004) and "Fashion-ology" (Berg 2005) which has been translated into Italian, Swedish, Russian and Chinese. Her third book "Doing Research in Fashion and Dress: An Introduction to Qualitative Research Methods" (Berg) is scheduled to be published in December 2010. She is currently conducting ethnographic fieldwork on Japanese youth subcultures and writing a book on "Japanese Youths as Producers of Urban Subcultures and Fashion Trends" (forthcoming in 2011). She serves as an editorial board member for two academic journals: Fashion Theory: The Journal of Dress, Body and Culture and Fashion Practice: The Journal of Design, Creative Process and the Fashion Industry. She earned her PhD in Sociology from Columbia University in 2001. She is also professionally trained as a fashion designer.