IngentaConnect Fashion Writing under the Fascist Regime: An Italian Dictionary a...

Author: Paulicelli, Eugenia

Source: Fashion Theory: The Journal of Dress, Body & Culture, Volume 8, Number 1, 1 March 2004 , pp. 3-34(32)

Abstract:

A detailed analysis of material largely neglected by Italian dress historians and cultural critics, and practically unknown to Anglo-American scholars, the article illustrates the key role played by the discourse on fashion during the fascist regime. In particular, the article focuses on two sources: Cesare Meano's Commentario dizionario italiano della moda (Commentary and Italian dictionary on fashion), published in 1936, and fashion writing in the magazine Bellezza. Under fascism, fashion became a state affair and in conjunction with other media was singled out by the regime as a powerful engine to mold and discipline the social body in both its public and personal manifestations. The analysis confirms fashion's two fold structure that gives rise to different practices and discourses: one leaning towards the law and the codification of manners and style; the other towards agency or the individual freedom to make up and create his/her own image and identity. An examination of fascist Italy's fashion policy reveals how aesthetics and style served not only the politics and policies of the regime, but also an individual creativity that shared little or nothing with the diktats of fascist bureaucrats.

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Fashion Writing under the Fascist Regime: An Italian Dictionary and Commentary of Fashion by Cesare Meano, and Short Stories by Gianna Manzini, and Alba De Cespedes