Suchergebnisse

This article addresses the issue of femme gaze and desire in relation to a range of heterosexual fashion advertisements from the British edition of the mainstream fashion magazine Vogue. It considers the lasting legacy of heterosexual feminist and lesbian feminist constructions of the gazing subject, particularly in terms of masculinity, trans-sex identification and masquerading. Both of these fields of knowledge have failed to recognize feminine and femme-inine viewing subjects and to include them in the field of visibility independently, without recourse to masculinity. The article considers possibilities for resistant femme visibility, identification, and desire. It argues through the analysis of fashion images that the concepts of femme-nity and femme-nine are useful in criticizing prevailing regulatory norms of perception and normative expectations on gender, as well as in denaturalizing the assumed relationship between the gaze, gender, sexuality, and desire.

"All publicity is good publicity? Perhaps not. In recent years global fashion brands, including Burberry, Dior, Dolce & Gabbana and Prada, have struggled to shake off costly scandals. Campaigns have been called out for cultural appropriation, racism, misogyny, and even flirting with fascism. Understanding Fashion Scandals is the first book to explore the changing landscape of contemporary fashion through case studies showing how 'shock value' lost its currency. The book focuses on the changes since the late-1970s/early 80s, when brands like Calvin Klein and Benetton first used controversy as a promotional tool to build their brand identity, to the contemporary industry where avoiding social media backlash is critical to survival. Analyzing the tactics brands adopt to avoid or mitigate scandals, Vänskä and Gurova map the fashion industry's journey towards cultural sustainability."

"Fashionable Childhood is the first book to critically examine representations of children and childhood through fashion media. Focussing on themes such as innocence, sexuality, class, and gender, this book provides a detailed and fascinating overview of the topic over the last 40 years. With case studies of advertising campaigns from international fashion brands such as Calvin Klein, Dior, Ralph Lauren and in-depth research into Italy's special edition of Vogue dedicated to childrenswear, Vogue Bambini, Fashionable Childhood examines the ways children's fashion is presented globally. With the market for children's fashion witnessing rapid growth in recent years, this exciting book will be of particular interest and value to students of fashion marketing, promotion, journalism, history, and theory"--

Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to examine mothers' social media accounts that focus on children's fashion. The authors probed children's fashion photo practices as representations of the mothers' extended self and the kind of childhood representations produced by the social media accounts. They also investigated mothers' perceptions of children's privacy when engaging in sharenting – the sharing of information about children or parenting online.


Design/methodology/approach
The study is based on 16 semi-structured interviews with Finnish mothers who had Instagram accounts focusing on children's fashion.


Findings
Children's fashion photos play a diverse role in mothers' identity work. The photos can be used to express a mother's taste and aesthetic skills, to express values, to fit into peer groups and to store memories of oneself and the children. Through the photos, representations of the prevailing Finnish childhood ideals, such as authenticity, naturalness and playfulness, are reproduced. The mothers perceived the children as part of their extended self and justified sharenting with mother- and child-centered arguments.


Originality/value
Through shedding light on the practices of social media fashion photography, this paper provides insights into how commercialism and social media shape cultural expectations for both motherhood and childhood. The paper contributes to previous research on sharenting, extending it to the context of fashion photography.

Purpose
– This article is a theoretical investigation about the babyfied dog and the troubled relationship between dogs and parenting in contemporary consumerist culture.


Design/methodology/approach
– In the frame of the special theme issue, the focus of the article is on theorising consumption and care in the context of new motherhood. The article analyses why the babyfied and fashionable dog has become so popular and what the human–dog/animal–transgression is about.


Findings
– The anthropomorphised animal is an integral part of constructing and understanding the romantic ideal of childhood and childhood innocence. Simultaneously with the modern educational attitude towards pets and animals in general, real animals, especially small lapdogs, have started to replace teddy bears and other plush animals as the dressed-up childlike animal. The tamed and designed animal is not completely an animal anymore and occupies the space between the human and the animal, becoming central to the reconfiguration of the family, childhood, leisure and identity. Currently, as the number of children in families decreases, the babyfied dog is taking the place traditionally reserved for the child.


Research limitations/implications
– Even though the findings cannot be generalised, they suggest that more research on the relationship between humans and dogs is needed.


Originality/value
– The article makes an original contribution to the theme issue by focusing on the still unusual, yet strongly emerging form of parenting and care of dogs. Doing this, the article challenges ideas about "natural parenting" by arguing that dogs are the latest babies and fashionable co-consumers.