FASHION AS COMMUNICATION 1 Fashion As

FASHION AS COMMUNICATION 1 Fashion as Communication: A semiotic analysis of fashion in the Harry Potter series Britney Newby University of North Alabama FASHION AS COMMUNICATION 2 Abstract This paper discusses the ways in which people communicate through fashion, and the semiotic effects on character interpretation. Through fashion, people express themselves to others. People make fast assumptions of another person by looking at clothing. This is most evident in costuming in film, and the Harry Potter films are an example throughout this paper. Costumes give insight into a character before the character speaks. Viewers are able to deduce whether a character is good or evil based on costumes. People can see that the character, Bellatrix Lestrange, is bad based on her dark clothing; just as people see Hermione Granger and know that she is good. Semiotic theory explains how people are able to make these assumptions. Dr. McMullen (2017) writes that semiotics is the study of signs, and the process of creating and maintaining signs. While there has been extensive research on semiotic theory, there has not been sufficient research on how semiotics are used in how people communicate through fashion. FASHION AS COMMUNICATION 3 Fashion as Communication: A semiotic analysis of fashion in the Harry Potter series People communicate with one another in many different ways. One immediate way of communication involves clothing. What people wear is an expression of their personality or how they want to be perceived by others. Many studies have been conducted on semiotics and sign theory. However, social scientists have not thoroughly researched the communicative effects of fashion. How important is clothing in how people express themselves to others? Do people make fast judgements and assumptions based on the semiotic aspects of other’s outfits? These questions have yet to be scientifically researched and answered. On the other hand, costume designers for theater and film conduct extensive research on how to express a character through clothing. In order to exemplify the point of this paper, the characters, Hermione Granger and Bellatrix Lestrange, from the Harry Potter series will be used to explain how costumes are important in understanding characters. This also allows for a deeper understanding of how people communicate through fashion with one another in reality. This paper will discuss the idea of clothing as a language, and will analyze the semiotic effects of color and design in the costumes of Hermione Granger and Bellatrix Lestrange. Literature Review Semiotics began to become a major approach to cultural studies in the 1950s and 1960s as a result of the work of the French structuralist, Roland Barthes. Dr. Janet McMullen (2017) discusses that “Roland Barthes introduced sign theory to the study of media messages in the 1950s. Applied to the elements of media messages and genres, he believed it could provide FASHION AS COMMUNICATION 4 insight into how meanings were built into them and how they might affect the receivers of the messages.” Barthes (1967) states the following: Semiology aims to take in any systems of signs, whatever their substance and limits; images, gestures, musical sounds, objects, and the complex associations of all of these, which for the content of ritual, convention or public entertainment: these constitute, if not languages, at least systems of signification (p. 9). In short, semiotics is the study of signs, and is used to help people understand the messages and texts in society. A sign is something that stands for something else. Types of signs include icon, index and symbol. In order to conduct a semiotic analysis of fashion, understanding codes is important. McMullen (2017) states, “codes are systems which link signs together in a way that reflects the ways in which a culture interprets its values.” She also explains that codes serve two functions: they help us see the view of a society a person has, and they simultaneously help determine what that view will be (McMullen, 2017). Within a semiotic analysis, this is the reason people interpret Bellatrix Lestrange as evil as soon as the character appears on screen, and also why viewers immediately understand that Hermione Granger is a smart, good character. In Fashion, Culture, and Identity Fred Davis (1992) writes, “I would hold that clothing styles and the fashions that influence them over time constitute something approximating a code” (p. 5). Clothing is a form of expression. Marianna Boero (2015), the author of the article, “The language of fashion in postmodern society: A social semiotic perspective,” writes, “if social semiotics focuses on the study of signs, spaces, and language mutations in the system of social discourses, fashion theory provides a perspective combining lifestyles, worldviews, personal FASHION AS COMMUNICATION 5 meanings, and social values about custom: indeed, in fashion we simultaneously observe participation in collective trends and the expression of individuality” (p. 303). What people choose to wear, or not wear, says a lot about them. There are many parallels between language/speech and fashion. In Language of Clothes, Alison Lurie (1981) writes, “sociologists tell us that fashion, too, is a language of signs, a nonverbal system of communication” (p. 3). Lurie delves into the language of fashion, and the ways in which people communicate through clothing choices. Lurie (1981) states, “you announce your sex, age, and class to me through what you are wearing- and very possibly give me important information (or misinformation) as to your occupation, origin, personality, opinions, tastes, sexual desires, and current mood” (p. 3). People choose what to wear to proclaim (or disguise) identities, and people make fast interpretations of other’s clothing in order to make living and working easier. Just like language, fashion has different dialects and accents. People have individual styles that are different from group to group and person to person. Lurie (1981) writes that “as with speech, each individual has his own stock of ‘words’ and employs personal variations of tone and meaning (p.4). Within the different individual styles, there are “limits imposed by economics, clothes are acquired, used and discarded just as words are, because they meet our needs and express our ideas and emotions (Lurie, 1981, p.12). Lurie (1981) also writes about Roland Barthes; and that in his book, The Diseases of Costume, Barthes speaks of “theatrical dress as a kind of writing, of which the basic element is the sign” (p. 3). Costumes become their own form of lines within a script. According to Richard Barsam and Dave Monahan (2016), the authors of Looking at Movies: An introduction to film, “Costumes can contribute to the setting and suggest specific character traits, such as social FASHION AS COMMUNICATION 6 station, self-image, the public image that the character is trying to project, state of mind, overall situation, and so on. Thus costumes are another element that helps tell a movie’s story” (p. 182). Also like speech, context is highly important with costuming, and “the meaning of any costume depends on circumstances” (Lurie, 1981, p. 12). An example of the importance of context is that the costumes of the wizards in Harry Potter appear completely normal until the characters leave the wizarding world and join the “muggles.” Suddenly, the costumes appear strange and out of place. Barsam and Monahan (2016) state that “the costumes must reflect the social structure and values of an imaginary society” (p. 185). However, Boero (2015) makes the point that fashion plays a larger role in social structure and culture. She writes, “The word ‘language’ does not indicate only a verbal dimension, but involves all the sign systems through which humans model their position and their relationship with the world: fashion falls into this definition because it has an axiological function, that is, the skill to produce social values” (p. 305). This language of fashion is used in the costume design throughout the Harry Potter films by the use of color, design, and other props included in a character’s costume. Discussion According to Lurie (1981), “the first and most important of these signs, and the one that makes the greatest impact, is color” (p. 182). Color makes an important semiotic contribution in many different contexts including fashion. Within semiotic theory, the study of colors has developed into color theory. We have grown up in the semiotic contract of our culture to know that certain colors carry certain connotations. In the article “New forms of writing, new visual competencies,” Theo van Leeuwen (2008) writes, “color is used to confer identity, whether the traditional, formal identities of heraldry, uniforms and ceremonial robes, or the modern FASHION AS COMMUNICATION 7 ‘psychographic,’ ‘lifestyle’ identities expressed through fashion, interior decoration and so on” (p. 132). The author goes on to explain that “identity values are established through the cultural connotations of the colors” (Leeuwen, 2008, p. 133). This is because colors can have different meanings within different cultures. Wearing bright colors can be seen as cheerful in one culture and disrespectful in another. In the Harry Potter series, the different school houses of Gryffindor, Slytherin, Ravenclaw and Hufflepuff have different colors associated with each house. Not only is this a way of distinguishing mini-cultures of students from one another, it also gives the viewer an insight into a character’s personality. Color is an important sign in semiotic analysis because “color in dress is also like tone of voice in speech in that it can completely alter the meaning of what is ‘said’ by other aspects of the costume: style, fabric and trimmings” (Lurie, 1981, p. 182). Color has the capability to change the meaning of an article of clothing. If Bellatrix wore the same costume, but in light blue, viewers might feel differently about her character; or if Hermione wore black all the time, viewers might make different assumptions.

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