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Fashion

The definition of fashion is basically rooted in the concept of "change" (Popescu, 2013). Fashion is constantly being altered, adapted and innovated in response to the ever changing taste of human societies. What was considered most fashionable in the 1980s may be considered laughable in our current era. Why?; because times, along with the associated norms and values, have changed. Globalization and technological breakthroughs like the television and social media have greatly increased the pace of change characteristic of fashion. The frequency of change in the fashion industry, believed to occur once every 10 years, Popescu (2013) argues this to be no longer the case. This explains why fashion journalists usually opt to define fashion as “What was ‘in’ yesterday is ‘out’ today” (Popescu, 2013). Any wonder, O’Cass (2004) defined fashion as “a result of ever-changing cultural shifts in preferences, tastes and choices.”

Fashion has also been defined as a means of communication. Communication is the art of transferring a message in the form of a code from a sender to a receiver. In the context of our study therefore, the message being sent is Viasat 1’s Fashion GH content, the receiver are the viewers of the fashion program and the sender is the production staff behind the creation of the fashion program.

Miuccia Prada, the brain behind Prada and Miu Miu puts it this way (Popescu, 2013):

"What you wear defines how you present yourself to others, especially today when human contacts are under the pressure of speed. Fashion is an instant language, the language of the moment."

Thus, she equates fashion to a language (or code) and languages are meant to be used for communication. This agrees with Davis (1992) who treated fashion as a code.

It therefore means that fashion is a key way by which we communicate what we are, or for lack of a better expression, “make a statement.” Mccarthy (2013) agrees with this view. In her doctoral dissertation, she suggests that people find self-expression and self-identity in fashion.

Hazel (1968:75) described fashion as ‘a particular kind of dress that prevails at any one time.’ However, Harold and Pomeroy (1992:6) describe fashion as “…social processes in which some people begin by adopting the image of people unlike themselves. Those in the same sector of society tend to emulate the distinctive appearance, with publicity in the media playing its part, as mentioned …until the differentiation disappears and the process begins all over again in the search for new appearance.” Dzramedo (2009) therefore argues that fashion is short lived and its popularity is restricted to a given time.

Overview of the Fashion Industry

Fashion is primarily concerned with the manufacturing and selling of clothes (McCarthy, 2013). However, there are those who are of the school of thought that the fashion industry (creates 'haute couture' literally meaning “high sewing”) is distinct from the apparel industry (responsible for producing 'mass fashion'). Nonetheless, McCarthy (2013) opined that this cannot be the case simply because prior to the 1970s, the boundaries between these two spectra ceased to exist. It must be said that irrespective of the fashion spectrum a fashion entity operates from, the same concepts from design to promotion is employed to get the produced article of fashion to the end-user (Steel and Major, 2013).

The fashion industry is huge considering its job creation potential and contribution to any nation's GDP. For example, a massive inflow of $20 million enters into the economy of New York City during Fashion week (Breyer, 2012. Moreover, the fashion industry in the United Kingdom is estimated to create 797,000 jobs, despite the decrement of 2.3 % from the year 2009 (BusinessVibes, 2015). As if that was not enough, the fashion industry as a whole directly contributes £26 billion to the U.K. economy – a figure believed to be one of the best globally. It is therefore no surprise to find that in 2010 alone, global clothing and textile industry, including footwear and luxury goods, hit nearly $3,000 trillion (Breyer, 2015).

Available data suggests that Asian economies are dominating the textile industry. Six years ago, the textile industry in China was responsible for processing 41.3 million tonnes of fibre, thereby generating more than 50% of global output. On the flip side, employment in the apparel manufacturing industry in the United States is on the decline (possibly because of outsourcing to Asia in a bid by western firms to take advantage of cheap labour); available data suggests that employment has gone down more than 80 % in the last 20 years (Breyer, 2012). This outsourcing effort by the West perhaps has contributed towards Asian countries like China (Rank: 1^st), India (Rank: 2^nd) and Thailand (Rank: 5^th) dominating the textile industry (BusinessVibes, 2015).

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The greatest proportion of global market for fashion consumption can be found in developed countries like the United States (U.S.), Germany, Italy and the UK. Currently, no other nation on the planet imports more garments than the U.S, most of them originating from China. However, in terms of extent of fashion consumption on the whole, Germany, Italy and the UK ranks top on the continent of Europe. In fact, in the European Union, average spending on fashion is approximately equivalent to $782 per year per capita.

Fashion shows in times past were exclusive to the rich and famous, the elites and a handful of industry stakeholders (McCarthy, 2013); but, times are changing. The fashion apparel industry has significantly evolved, particularly over the last 20 years (Bhardwaj & Fairhurst, 2010). The changing dynamics of the fashion industry have forced retailers to desire low cost and flexibility in design, quality, and speed to market, key strategies to maintain a profitable position in the increasingly demanding market (Bhardwaj & Fairhurst, 2010). McCarthy (2013) also observed that players in the fashion industry are beginning to diversify from their traditional target market – the upper class – precipitated by the 2008 economic downturn. They are now starting to partner with lower end retailers to help reach price-conscious consumers whose purchasing powers are restricted by a tight budget. Consequently, they have had to find new and innovative ways of reaching this new target market (McCarthy, 2013). This is where technological innovations like the Internet, social media and television come in. As a result, more people than ever are being exposed to the fashion industry through television and the like.

The Evolution of Fashion

Studying the concept of fashion, Frings (1999) observed that fashion is made up of three components: style, change and acceptance. The change component agrees with Popescu (2013). Style has to do with the chicness or elegance of the clothing or how the apparel looks; Change pertains to how fast fashion ‘moves’ such that what is fashionable today is not tomorrow or the fickle nature of the industry; Acceptance entails the attitude of consumers towards the newly introduced style - for a style to become fashion consumers have to buy and wear it. Together, these three components initiate fashion evolution or fashion cycles. And television plays no small role in making this happen, particularly with the “Acceptance” component.

Dzramedo (2009) argues that fashion cycles goes through five different stages. Stage one is when a fashion designer puts out a new style onto the fashion scene; the second stage is when consumers increasingly accept this new style thus the new style heightens in popularity; the third stage is where the new style reaches the pinnacle of its popularity, well known and eventually becomes a common design; in the fourth stage the style starts becoming increasingly less popular; the fifth stage marks the fading out or rejection of the style from the fashion scene.

Brief Historical Overview of Fashion in Ghana

Dressing is a critical component of the culture of any people (Dzramedo, 2009). In the 1700s, clothing in Ghana was primarily traditional in nature, removed from western influences. Amankwah, Howard & Sarpong (2012) reported that the nature of clothing, during that period, was reflective of rank and status of the individual within the community. Owusu (1999) notes that it was usually wrapped around without stitches, so that it hangs from the navel downwards, covering half of the legs and at times, wrapped around the neck and shoulders.

Again, during the 1700s the Ga people were used to wearing a loincloth between their legs and looped over leather bead belt. Usually the back end hung lower than the front and this description is akin to “danta,” waist-girdle which was worn among the Akans some years ago. Seiber (1974) states that, the Garments were larger cloths which served as blankets at night and as a lounge dress in the morning usually worn by wrapping it round the body so that one arm was left uncovered. This description is also similar to men’s traditional clothing styles among the Akans, which uses about ten (10) yards of fabric, wrapped around the body and hanged on one shoulder, particularly the left arm. This description of men’s clothing is rather popular among most men in the southern part of Ghana which has largely become national attire among Ghanaian men in general today. Those from the North were reported to wear several layers of clothes, five to six wrapped around their body in a decent manner (Gadzekpo, 2005). The youth on the other hand did not dress so pompously, but wore only a good “paan,” a cap made of hart’s skin upon their heads, and a staff in their hands. Also a string or chain of coral, about their heads; and this is the dress they appear in daily (Amankwah et al., 2012).

However, as the pressures of colonization gained the ascendancy, western style of dressing began to infiltrate the Ghanaian's traditional mode of dressing. According to Bosmas (1967) there was gradual influence on the clothing styles along the coastal lands which came about with the arrival of the Portuguese and other foreign travelers through the trading in of European clothes and other goods for gold.

Loincloths were in fact used in both the coastal and central parts of the country; but this trend began to change as the Europeans began to gain access to the hinterlands. Since then the Ghanaian clothing style has become an adaptation of western fashion trends. European influence has pervaded every facet of social life; from education, religion, politics, social change, to fashion. The foreign influence has robbed us as a nation and especially the youth of our identity as a people. This is not the case in most developed countries whose clothing has had so much impact on how the youth clothe themselves these days (Amankwah et al., 2012).

A study conducted showed that 23 % respondents (7 out of 30) prefer locally influenced fashion to Ghanaian type, whilst a massive 60 % (18 out of 30) on the contrary preferred foreign influenced fashion; but then, 17 % (5 out of 30) went for a blend of the two (Amankwah et al., 2012). A follow up question as to which type of clothing respondents would purchase, 70 % (21 out of 30) opted for foreign manufactured clothing, whereas 30 % (9 out of 30) said they would rather buy locally manufactured clothing. It would be interesting to find out to what extent western fashion has impacted each particular ethnic group in Ghana.

In recent times, however the one tool that has facilitated the infiltration of western style of dressing into the Ghanaian culture has been exposure to media; and not colonization as it was the case in times past.

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Some References

Ainosoon, S.C. (1999). Dress fashion adoption by adolescents at Asawasi in Kumasi. B. Ed Unpublished Thesis. University College of Winneba.

Amankwah, A. M., Howard, E. K., & Sarpong, G. D. (2012). Foreign fashion and its impact on the local fashion industry. International Journal of Innovative Research and Development, 1(11), 562–575.

Anton, S. D., Perri, M. G., & Riley, J. R. (2000). Discrepancy between actual and ideal body images impact on eating and exercise behavior. Eating Behaviors, 1, 153-160.

Bandura, A., Ross, D., & Ross, S. (1963). Imitation of film-mediated aggressive models. Journal of Abnormal and Social Psychology, 63, 575-582.

Bhardwaj, V., & Fairhurst, A. (2010). Fast fashion: response to changes in the fashion industry. The International Review of Retail, Distribution and Consumer Research. doi:10.1080/09593960903498300

Bosmas, W. (1967). A New and Accurate Description of the Coast of Guinea, 4th Eng. edition, London: Frank Cass and Co Ltd.

Breyer, M. (2012). 25 Shocking Fashion Industry Statistics. Available on http://www.treehugger.com/sustainable-?‐fashion/25-?‐shocking-?‐fashion-?‐industry-?‐statistics.htmln, date accessed 2/2/2016.