Skip to main content

Site navigation

  • University of Technology Sydney home
  • Home

    Home
  • For students

  • For industry

  • Research

Explore

  • Courses
  • Events
  • News
  • Stories
  • People

For you

  • Libraryarrow_right_alt
  • Staffarrow_right_alt
  • Alumniarrow_right_alt
  • Current studentsarrow_right_alt
  • Study at UTS

    • arrow_right_alt Find a course
    • arrow_right_alt Course areas
    • arrow_right_alt Undergraduate students
    • arrow_right_alt Postgraduate students
    • arrow_right_alt Research Masters and PhD
    • arrow_right_alt Online study and short courses
  • Student information

    • arrow_right_alt Current students
    • arrow_right_alt New UTS students
    • arrow_right_alt Graduates (Alumni)
    • arrow_right_alt High school students
    • arrow_right_alt Indigenous students
    • arrow_right_alt International students
  • Admissions

    • arrow_right_alt How to apply
    • arrow_right_alt Entry pathways
    • arrow_right_alt Eligibility
arrow_right_altVisit our hub for students

For you

  • Libraryarrow_right_alt
  • Staffarrow_right_alt
  • Alumniarrow_right_alt
  • Current studentsarrow_right_alt

POPULAR LINKS

  • Apply for a coursearrow_right_alt
  • Current studentsarrow_right_alt
  • Scholarshipsarrow_right_alt
  • Featured industries

    • arrow_right_alt Agriculture and food
    • arrow_right_alt Defence and space
    • arrow_right_alt Energy and transport
    • arrow_right_alt Government and policy
    • arrow_right_alt Health and medical
    • arrow_right_alt Corporate training
  • Explore

    • arrow_right_alt Tech Central
    • arrow_right_alt Case studies
    • arrow_right_alt Research
arrow_right_altVisit our hub for industry

For you

  • Libraryarrow_right_alt
  • Staffarrow_right_alt
  • Alumniarrow_right_alt
  • Current studentsarrow_right_alt

POPULAR LINKS

  • Find a UTS expertarrow_right_alt
  • Partner with usarrow_right_alt
  • Explore

    • arrow_right_alt Explore our research
    • arrow_right_alt Research centres and institutes
    • arrow_right_alt Graduate research
    • arrow_right_alt Research partnerships
arrow_right_altVisit our hub for research

For you

  • Libraryarrow_right_alt
  • Staffarrow_right_alt
  • Alumniarrow_right_alt
  • Current studentsarrow_right_alt

POPULAR LINKS

  • Find a UTS expertarrow_right_alt
  • Research centres and institutesarrow_right_alt
  • University of Technology Sydney home
University of Technology Sydney home University of Technology Sydney home
  1. home
  2. arrow_forward_ios ... About UTS
  3. arrow_forward_ios ... Information on Faculties...
  4. arrow_forward_ios Faculty of Design, Archi...
  5. arrow_forward_ios Fashion Studies: An International Perspective

Fashion Studies: An International Perspective

Design staff project, Fashion Studies International Workshop
Design staff project, Fashion Studies International Workshop
Design staff project, Fashion Studies International Workshop
Design staff project, Fashion Studies International Workshop
Design staff project, Fashion Studies International Workshop

Fashion Studies: An International Perspective

Peter McNeil

The two-day workshop Fashion Studies: An International Perspective was held at the University of Technology, Sydney, from 5-7 April 2018, funded by the Australian Academy of the Humanities within the Academy’s The Arts Section and UTS. Co-chaired by organiser Professor Peter McNeil FAHA (UTS) and Dr Melissa Bellanta (ACU), the event brought together over 40 art historians, literary theorists, Asian Studies specialists, designers, material culture anthropologists and curators from 16 different universities in Australia, Taiwan, Japan, Canada and France to discuss the current questions and future directions of Fashion Studies as design and cultural practice.

Fashion Studies has emerged in the past ten years as a vibrant research topic, originating in part from women’s studies, literary theory, sociology, business and labour histories, and queer histories of the 1970s-90s.

Day 1 focused on the ‘material turn’ in Fashion Studies and its relationship to historical reconstruction and theories of embodiment. Keynote Professor Beverly Lemire from the University of Alberta used a case study of a largely forgotten winter sport – tobogganing - and a surviving nineteenth-century tobogganing suit to discuss ‘intimate contact zones’. She examined how an indigenous garment, technology and social practice was ‘repurposed’ by Canadian settler societies to become a ‘national’ sporting dress, spreading to North America, Europe and parts of the British Empire, including Australia.

Day 2 further considered the politics and transmission of fashion. In the first session, Wiradjuri/Kalari man Michael McDaniel gave a presentation that greatly affected participants. He brought along a possum skin cape he had crafted himself and ‘talked’ to the object, raising important issues about the clothing objects and practices that were banned by legal or other means for indigenous Australians under assimilatory practices. In his presentation, Mr McDaniel spoke to the resurgence of possum skin cloak making (badhang galang wilay) and what it means to Aboriginal peoples in forging stronger connections to history/story and visibility.

Keynotes Professor Antonia Finnane FAHA and Dr Hissako Anjo then examined the rise of the men’s suit in East Asia and in doing so, brought together histories of technological innovation with theories of communication and cultural change. They analysed fashion as a space where cultures meet, often with asymmetric power, in order to challenge the model of the ‘westernisation’ of Japanese and Chinese dress from the 1860s.

Fashion as a coping mechanism within ‘lived lives’ also emerged as a significant theme, not only for women but also marginalised groups of men such as Indigenous Australians, queer men, immigrants and day labourers, as demonstrated in Professor Mina Roces FAHA’s moving account of men’s fashion practices amongst young Filipino immigrant labourers in 1920s California. These men were banned from public spaces including clubs and restaurants but were able to use fashion as a ‘porous’ and complex way to negotiate their lives through and against racist barriers.

The event was attended by a post-graduate delegation from National Yang-Ming University Taiwan and the National Palace Museum under the direction of Dr Chia-hua Yeh, Graduate Institute for Studies in Visual Cultures, now NCTU.

Overall, the event generated deeper understandings of how the habitus for fashion is created in different centres and how designers are legitimised within national and wider cultural spaces. It concluded that Australia is significant for the decentring of dominant European histories and the decolonisation of knowledge, an area in which the study of fashion and dress practices can flourish.  A strong sense of what constitutes ‘Fashion Studies’ in the Asia Pacific region was realised, and the workshop underscored the risky but worthwhile challenge of navigating inter-disciplinary research. Findings of the workshop were published as papers in a special issue of the international journal Fashion Theory ‘The Making Turn’ published online and in hardcopy from May-September 2019.


Read more:
Workshop participant, Dr Madeleine Seys, has posted her reflections from the event – Weaving the Threads Together: Reflecting on ‘Fashion Studies: An International Perspective’

Dr Sarah Bendall blogs about publishing her findings following the event - https://sarahabendall.wordpress.com

Fashion Theory: ‘Special Issue – the Making Turn’, editors McNeil and Bellanta, 2019:

Hilary Davidson, ‘The Making Turn: Reconstructing Dress History as an Academic Practice’

Dr Sarah Bendall, ‘The Case of the ‘French Varddingale’

Catriona Fisk, ‘Looking for Maternity’ 

Dr Todd Robinson, ‘Attaining Poise’


About the image
Segundo ‘‘Sunny’’ Bautista (L), Cornelio ‘‘Charlie’’ Bautista (R) and Estapanio ‘‘Larry’’ Bautista (seated). First wave Filipino migrants to the USA (California) in tailor-made suits dressed for a studio photograph, c1930. Courtesy Anita Navalta Bautista and Mina Roces.

School of Design
Share
Share this on Facebook Share this on Twitter Share this on LinkedIn
DAB Design, staff project Fashion to Costume

Fashion to Costume: Costume to Fashion

Peter McNeil

DAB Design, staff project Imagining Fashion Futures Lab

Imagining Fashion Futures Lab

DAB staff project, Dressed to Quill

Understanding the feathered showgirl: a study in fashion, gender and consumption

Emily Brayshaw

Mannequin, staff project The macaroni and changing definitions of manhood

The macaroni and changing definitions of manhood

Peter McNeil

DAB staff collection, Data Lace

Data Lace

Cecilia Heffer

after the australian ugliness cover

After the Australian Ugliness

Acknowledgement of Country

UTS acknowledges the Gadigal People of the Eora Nation and the Boorooberongal People of the Dharug Nation upon whose ancestral lands our campuses now stand. We would also like to pay respect to the Elders both past and present, acknowledging them as the traditional custodians of knowledge for these lands. 

University of Technology Sydney

City Campus

15 Broadway, Ultimo, NSW 2007

Get in touch with UTS

Follow us

  • Instagram
  • LinkedIn
  • YouTube
  • Facebook

A member of

  • Australian Technology Network
Use arrow keys to navigate within each column of links. Press Tab to move between columns.

Study

  • Find a course
  • Undergraduate
  • Postgraduate
  • How to apply
  • Scholarships and prizes
  • International students
  • Campus maps
  • Accommodation

Engage

  • Find an expert
  • Industry
  • News
  • Events
  • Experience UTS
  • Research
  • Stories
  • Alumni

About

  • Who we are
  • Faculties
  • Learning and teaching
  • Sustainability
  • Initiatives
  • Equity, diversity and inclusion
  • Campus and locations
  • Awards and rankings
  • UTS governance

Staff and students

  • Current students
  • Help and support
  • Library
  • Policies
  • StaffConnect
  • Working at UTS
  • UTS Handbook
  • Contact us
  • Copyright © 2025
  • ABN: 77 257 686 961
  • CRICOS provider number: 00099F
  • TEQSA provider number: PRV12060
  • TEQSA category: Australian University
  • Privacy
  • Copyright
  • Disclaimer
  • Accessibility