Patterns & Metaphors
Clothing
Template:
Clothing represents two levels of symbolism. In the first instance people's choices of styles and colours of clothing, the amount of clothing they wear, and the conspicuous absence or presence of a particular garment, may be symbolically indicative and constitute a third order of communication after verbal and body languages. The second level of symbolism is the subconscious presentation of articles of clothing to the conscious mind, in dream and waking state imagery, and the conscious use of garment symbols in the arts. In the art of the cinema, for example, just as indispensable as the casting director and the make-up man are to the correct symbolic typology of the performers, so also are the costumers and wardrobe department for the symbolically appropriate garments. Typical examples are the clichés of the black hats and masks, and sometimes totally black costumes, of the hero's or heroine's antagonists. Other clichés in general use are smoking jacket or tuxedo, long fur coat, very low-cut evening dress, man's trench or rain-coat with upturned collar, hoods of various shapes and colours, veils, riding boots, capes, deer-stalker hat, pith helmet, riding breeches, tennis clothes, bathing suit, gun-holster, homemaker's apron, negligee, cowboy hat, the livery of butlers, chauffeurs and maids, women's sweaters, Christmas stockings, Indian feather-head-dress, and primitive peoples' loincloths.
Metaphor:
Symbolic apparel can express the wide range of human behaviour. This includes economic behaviour since many jobs and professions are associated with particular clothing articles and these garments come to symbolize the occupation. Examples are: construction worker's hard-hat, miner's head-lamp, British policeman's helmet, doctor's white coat, judge's robes, (formerly) office-workers' eyeshade, and a number of special hats for bakers, chefs, firemen, military personnel, religious dignitaries or believers, artists (beret), prisoners and plutocrats (homburg). The hat is, in fact, probably the single most important item of apparel from the point of view of what it communicates symbolically. Using hats or head garments as the best example, one can point to other levels of symbolism. For example, the image of a hatless person among others with hats may indicate a lack of identity or of rôle, or an inferior position, socially or psychologically. A person with a higher broader, or more expensive hat, or such a hat itself, may indicate authority or dignity. Generally antithetical are broad brims versus narrow or no brims; stiff upright shapes versus soft, flattened ones, dark colours versus bright, and ornamental versus plain, etc. Hat styles of other nationalities or ethnic groups when worn by a non-member may indicate respect for that group. This is true also of non-working-class people wearing workers clothing; for example, kerchiefs, jeans, rough sweaters and various sorts of caps. It is a subconscious expression of solidarity with the working masses, often affected by university students.<
