Concepts and processes of generating and communicating meanings in fashion of dress

Abstract

The apparel industry of Sri Lanka is one of the biggest industries in the island, and it plays a key role in advancing the country’s economy. The design, manufacture and export of textiles and apparel products are accounted for half of the country’s total exports. Sri Lanka is among the top apparel producing countries in the world and therefore it is required to carry out an in-depth study. Fashion designers are responsible for the changes in the fashion industry and create new meanings for fashion. Every new season, collections are launched worldwide and new styles are set for people to follow. Fashion designers need an artistic bent of mind and excellent sense of dress communication of the people in society. A new fashion of dress would not simply becomes none verbal communicative object, it requires certain theories to be revealed during the process of research. Selection of appropriate methodology to find sources, to design the research in systematic way proceeds to sorting and identifying the underlying theoretical concepts. The research is focused on how the different categories of people represented themselves and communicated through their dress. Some aspects of this phenomena is what social , cultural and political pressure give rise to new dress forms and fashion trend setting , how a wearer communicate fashion to the society, how communication of meanings in dress makes fashion popular or change. Several concepts show how the meaning of a dress emerged and how it communicated according to the theoretical system. The concept phrase of this exploration is that; ‘Social and Cultural factors are directly affected to the dress expression since the semantic meanings are highly arbitrary and the dress expressions are highly context dependant. If all contexts are removed from a dress all meanings are also removed’. The work presented in this thesis is diverse, though sufficient depth was ensured in the research; each area may have further potential for detailed research in the field of fashion. Key words: Dress, Fashion, Sign, Non verbal Communication, Culture