Femininity, Feminism, & The Beauty Myth Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 2000 words

Femininity, Feminism, & The Beauty Myth - Essay Example 96). This essay discusses this statement with regard to the concepts of femininity, feminism, and ‘the beauty myth’ by Naomi Wolf. Most apparently, Bennett is trying to argue that fashion is a type of nonverbal communication. It is easy to see that even when articles of clothing are coated with words, like catchphrases, logotypes, or trademark name for instance, there remains a degree of nonverbal communication that goes beyond the exact messages of those catchphrases or trademark names (Barnard 2002, 29). There are several scholars who take into consideration numerous instances of terms or phrases being used on fashion, tracing their connections to calligraphy, foreign languages, punk, and graffiti, for instance. Fashion makes use of these expressions to offer willing consumers more ways to visually communicate themselves (Barnard 2002, 29). The issue then comes up as to whether, since they are types of nonverbal expression, fashion could be viewed as being somehow similar to written or verbal communication. For instance, when Umberto Eco declares to be communicating through his attires he perhaps implies that he is following fashion to perform the same kinds of tasks as he makes use of verbal expression to perform in other circumstances Essentially, the symbolism of Eco appears to indicate that fashion is created into something similar to a language (Barnard 2002, 29). Alison Lurie, in The Language of Clothes, seems to think that there is an open similarity. She argues that there are numerous distinct expressions of fashion, each espousing its own language. In view of this, fashion is the counterpart of word and could be assembled into ‘expressions’ (p. 29-30). For instance, as explained by Barnard (2002), Lurie proposes that an individual having hardly any clothes, will have little opportunity to build more