Fashion is a means of expressing one's identity. In today's society many times judgement of a person first depends on their appearance. Tim Dant, in Material Culture, touches on

Commodity is used to express a subculture's identity. Regardless of the meaning attached to the commodity, it is always related to mass-production; so it is difficult for a subculture to maintain authenticity. Freaks use fashion to express their resistance to conformity. However, with fashion being such a prominent form of commodity, it is difficult to avoid commercialization, let alone an "absolute distinction" between what is original and what is mainstream sell-out. Where there is mass-production, there is mass-consumption. Nothing can be kept out of the claws of the profitable popular market. Elizabeth Wilson, who analyzes the relationship of fashion and advertising in Adorned in Dreams, supports Hebdige's idea that it is virtually impossible to stay out of the mainstream. She explains that corporate power abducts subculture styles and turns them into "must-have" fashions, "in such a society each new idea becomes a grist to the mill of profit. Style deviance and s!

It (subculture) communicates through commodities even if the meanings attached to those commodities are purposefully distorted or overthrown. It is therefore difficult in this case to maintain any absolute distinction between commercial exploitation on the one hand and creativity/originality on the other, even though these categories are emphatically opposed in the value systems of most subcultures

The question first presented was whether the freak subculture really made a difference or if it has been consumed by industry. From what has been portrayed, freaks lost their power to popular culture. We are made to think that it is the subcultures that are influencing fashion and lifestyle but it is commercialism that takes control. As a subculture, freaks did make an impact on society by forcing the public to see them and mocking society's conformist view of life. However, society, lead by the fashion and advertising industry, consumed the

Where it might be argued that the desire for change would be more meaningfully pursued in realm of concerted social action, fashion offered a continually changing outlet that located personal fulfillment, a sense of self, alongside the canals of social conformity.

Some topics in this essay:
Material Culture, Wilson-157 Wilson, Harris-47 Typical, Dick Hebdige, Daniel Harris, Nonetheless Ewens, Conquest Cool, Elizabeth Wilson, Asa Berger, Sarah Thornton, freak culture, freak fashion, fashion advertising, fashion industry, advertising industry, corporate control, subversive fashion, fashion trends, freak style, social reform, fashion advertising industry, expressing one's identity, social reform tool, fashion means expressing, means social reform,