Fashion Victims: On the Individualizing and De-individualizing Powers of Fashion

Abstract

This article discusses the popular notion of the “fashion victim.” It conceives of the notion of fashion victimization as an integral part of existence in modern individualized society. 1) Through analyzing different accounts of fashion victimization, I aim to distil a common phenomenological core extant in these experiences. As we will see, these experiences tell us a great deal about the individualizing and de-individualizing dynamics of fashion. 2) This analysis can be used, so I argue, to understand fashion as a sociocultural dynamic on its own terms. In so doing, I mean to isolate the most important elements of the experiences connected to fashion dynamics, and thus create a phenomenological concept of fashion that captures all manifestations of fashion in society. 3) On the phenomenological level, the deciding factor is the object. It is through the experience of the fashionable object that the individualizing and de-individualizing powers of fashion are mediated.