Fashion Victims –and Men with Beards

CMCI senior lecturer Dr Jo Entwistle appeared on BBC Radio 4s “Thinking Aloud” programme to talk about how we make sense of fashions.

First, she discussed fashions that cause harm or even kill (for example, mercury and arsenic in dyes, flammable clothing especially Victorian women’s dresses). Second, she spoke about male facial hair and why so many men are growing beards and what they say about contemporary masculinity.

Dr Entwistle argued that there’s a tendency to see women as ‘victims’ of fashion when there is much evidence to suggest men are equally caught up in the fashion system.

She was speaking with host Professor Laurie Taylor, and the whole programme can be found at: http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b06sj050