Fashion Studies at the Frontlines: Reflections on the Possibilities and Pitfalls of Undergraduate Fashion Studies

Although fashion studies has existed as an academic field (albeit with blurred boundaries) since at least 1985 when Elizabeth Wilson published her seminal text, 'Adorned in Dreams,' scholars still describe the field as “new” and “in-becoming.” The truth, however, is that more than three decades on, fashion studies as an interdisciplinary, multi-methodological field of scholarly inquiry is fairly well-defined. The sheer abundance of fashion studies graduate programs, conferences and peer-reviewed journals stands as a testament to this. Less well understood, however, is how fashion studies manifests within undergraduate programs with concentrations in fashion design and merchandising—or, as this paper poses, at the “frontlines” of the industry. Drawing on my experience teaching fashion studies at both the Centre for Fashion Studies at Stockholm University and at Columbia College Chicago, this paper will offer a much needed mapping of the field of undergraduate fashion studies. It will argue that, different from graduate fashion studies programs that prepare students for careers in academia, fashion studies at the undergraduate level presents an interesting opportunity to flesh out a “fashion studies praxis.” A secondary aim of this paper is to provide a space in which to discuss the possibilities and pitfalls of teaching “pure” fashion studies within institutions that are under enormous pressure to make students career ready. Questions to be explored include: Where does undergraduate fashion studies curriculum exist? What does (and should) it look like? And in which ways does undergraduate fashion studies surface a “new” great divide between industry and academia?