Illustrate and critically discuss the visual semiotics of hats.
For general guidance about what is expected in your essays for this module,
see the
general criteria.
Please remember to avoid footnotes and to include an
alphabetical list of 'References' which have been cited in the text
(not a Bibliography of anything you have read for the essay). This list should include
author's names, date, book titles (in italics), place of publication and publisher.
Within the text always cite author's surname, date and page number. Double-space your
text and number your pages. For more detailed notes on writing essays in this
department, click
here.
Advice for this particular assignment:
Don't forget that this is not just about hats, but about the semiotics of hats, so make sure that you
make reference to relevant semiotic concepts such as codes and connotations,
and show how semiotic approaches can shed light on the subject (you might find commutation tests useful).
What are hats for? They clearly have symbolic and connotational values beyond their purely practical functions.
One interesting issue is that of how one type of hat is distinguished from another (e.g. a
fedora from a trilby). How are particular kinds of hats seen as signifying something about the wearer?
What leads to some kinds of hat being seen as suitable for one sex rather than the other? What class
connotations do particular kinds of hats generate? Why would some people 'never be seen dead in' a particular
kind of hat?
How do people learn the codes and connotations of hats?
One source of such ideas may be fashion guides (some of which are easily accessible online).
To what extent in and what ways do they draw upon
their use in contexts such as: a) cultural and subcultural traditions; b) celebrity wearers; and c) popular films and television series?
What parts do hats play in people's sense of their own identities? Interviews may offer an effective tool for
gathering data on people's ways of framing this issue (don't forget to anonymise informants).
Use this consent form:
Consent Form for Interviews, Photography and Recording.
This essay needs relevant illustrations to help make points.
Remember to include a list labelled either Figures or Image sources after your
list of References.
Only some of the books on the suggested reading are explicitly semiotic and you may need to recast their
insights within a semiotic framework.
Some suggested reading
- Barnard, Malcolm (1996)
Fashion as Communication. London: Routledge
- Barnes, Ruth & Joanne B. Eicher (Eds) (1993)
Dress and Gender: Making and Meaning. Providence, RI: Berg
- Barthes, Roland (1985)
The Fashion System (trans. Matthew Ward & Richard Howard). London: Jonathan Cape
- Barthes, Roland (2006)
The Language of Fashion (trans. Andy Stafford). Oxford: Berg
- Berger, Arthur Asa (2010)
The Objects of Affection: Semiotics and Consumer Culture. New York: Palgrave Macmillan
- Binder, Pearl (1986)
Dressing Up, Dressing Down. London: Allen & Unwin
- Breward, Christopher (1995)
The Culture of Fashion: A New History of Fashionable Dress. Manchester: Manchester University Press
- Buckley, Cheryl & Hilary Fawcett (2002)
Fashioning the Feminine: Representation and Women's Fashion from the Fin de Siécle to the Present. London: Tauris
- Calefato, Patrizia (2004)
The Clothed Body. Oxford: Berg
- Chandler, Daniel (2007)
Semiotics: The Basics (2nd Edn.). London: Routledge
- Chandler, Daniel and Rod Munday (2011)
Dictionary of Media and Communication. Oxford: Oxford University Press
- Chico, Beverly (2013)
Hats and Headwear Around the World: A Cultural Encyclopedia. Santa Barbara, CA: ABC-CLIO
- Crane, Diana (2000)
Fashion and its Social Agendas. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press
- Crow, David (2003)
Visible Signs: An Introduction to Semiotics. Crans-près-Céligny, Switzerland: AVA
- Danesi, Marcel (1994)
Messages and Meanings: An Introduction to
Semiotics. Toronto: Canadian Scholars' Press
- Danesi, Marcel (1999)
Of Cigarettes, High Heels and Other Interesting Things:
An Introduction to Semiotics. London: Macmillan [a wide-ranging elementary introduction]
- Davis, Fred (1992)
Fashion, Culture and Identity. Chicago: University of Chicago Press
- Entwhistle, Joanne & Elizabeth Wilson (Eds) (2001)
Body Dressing. Oxford: Berg
- Finkelstein, Joanne (2007)
The Art of Self Invention: Image and Identity in Popular Visual Culture. London: Tauris
- Hebdige, Dick (1979)
Subculture: The Meaning of Style. London: Methuen
- Henley, Nancy (1977)
Body Politics: Power, Sex, and Nonverbal Communication. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall.
- Holbrook, Morris B. & Elizabeth C. Hirschman (1993)
The Semiotics of Consumption:
Interpreting Symbolic Consumer Behavior in Popular Culture and Works of Art. Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter
- Hollander, Anne (1978)
Seeing Through Clothes. Berkeley, CA: University of California Press
- Johnson, Kim K. P. & Sharron J. Lennon (Eds) (1999)
Appearance and Power. Oxford: Berg
- Kaiser, Susan B. (1997)
The Social Psychology of Clothing: Symbolic Appearances in Context (2nd Edn). New York: Fairchild
- Kidwell, Claudia Brush & Valerie Steele (Eds) (1989)
Men and Women: Dressing the Part. Washington: Smithsonian Institution Press
- Leach, Edmund (1976)
Culture and Communication: The Logic by which Symbols are Connected. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press
- Leeds-Hurwitz, Wendy (1993)
Semiotics and Communication: Signs, Codes, Cultures. Hillsdale, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum
- Lurie, Alison (1981)
The Language of Clothes. London: Heinemann
- Roach, Mary Ellen & Joanne Bubolz Eicher (Eds) (1965)
Dress, Adornment and the Social Order. New York: John Wiley
- Roach-Higgins, Mary Ellen, Joanne B. Eicher & Kim K. P. Johnson (Eds) (1995)
Dress and Identity. New York: Fairchild
- Rubinstein, Ruth P. (1995)
Dress Codes: Meanings and Messages in American Culture. Boulder. CO: Westview Press
- Solomon, Michael R. (1985)
The Psychology of Fashion. Lexington, MA: Lexington Books/Heath
- Stone, Elaine & Jean A. Samples (1990)
Fashion Merchandising: An Introduction. New York: McGraw-Hill
- van Leeuwen, Theo (2004)
Introducing Social Semiotics. London: Routledge
- Wilson, Elizabeth (1985)
Adorned in Dreams: Fashion and Modernity. London: Virago
- Woodhall, Trinny & Susannah Constantine (2003)
What Not to Wear For Every Occasion. London: Weidenfeld & Nicolson
Note: Treat with extreme caution sources labelled with this symbol!