Fashion Careers Background Clothing has been worn by people of all cultures since prehistoric times; its basic function was to protect the body from the elements. Clothing styles have been influenced by well-known people, religion, tradition, art, science, and more recently, the media. Archaeologists have found no clothing from early periods before the Stone Age.
In 1957 Vance Packard complained that the manufacturers of typewriters and telephones had recently begun producing models in a wide range of colors rather than in their traditional black. He critically surmised that the sole motive for this innovation was “to make owners dissatisfied with their plain old black models” (Packard 1957, 72). Packard understood
Fashion, as extension of a human being beyond the corporeal body, is also a method of demarcating sameness and difference. As communicated through advertising, fashion not only reflects an individual’s self-image, but also is done in anticipation of how others will regard the dramaturgical display (Goffman 1959). As an expression of popular preferences and culture