MA FASHION STUDIES
PARSONS THE NEW SCHOOL FOR DESIGN

In this groundbreaking MA program, launching in fall 2010, students will engage in the evolving field of fashion studies. Using an interdisciplinary approach, they will explore fashion as object, image, practice, theory, and concept and develop a critical understanding of its complex global intersections with identities, histories, and cultures in the contemporary world.

Recognizing the growing significance of fashion as a cultural, social, and economic force, the MA program in Fashion Studies offers an entryway into careers in fashion research, academia, and the culture industries. MA Fashion Studies is of particular interest to students with art and design, liberal arts, social sciences, or economics backgrounds who wish to critically analyze fashion.

Core and elective courses open up broad perspectives on fashion and its interfaces with design, production, consumption, imagination, representation, embodiment, and identity.

Students investigate the complex material and visual dimensions of fashion, as dress, image, bodily practice, and as a major culture industry that positions the individual within the social and global world. Students also explore the interdisciplinary theories and methodologies that have informed the evolving field of fashion studies as well as contribute their own inquiries to its advancement.

CONNECTED TO THE NEW SCHOOL
AND NEW YORK CITY

Part of the School of Art and Design History and Theory at Parsons The New School for Design, MA Fashion Studies builds on Parson’ strength in innovative fashion and design education.

Responding to the interdisciplinary nature of fashion and the field of fashion studies, the courses in this master’s program include perspectives and approaches of a variety of disciplines, including fashion history and theory, art and design studies, history, museum studies, anthropology, sociology, ethnology, economics, geography, cultural studies, literary theory, gender and queer studies, and film and visual studies.

With a focus on interdisciplinary research, MA in Fashion Studies draws on the rich resources of New York City and The New School. The program works with other graduate programs at Parsons, particularly the MA in the History of Decorative Arts and Design and the new MFA in Fashion Design and Society, as well as with programs in other New School divisions.

CURRICULUM

With a 42-credit structure, the curriculum is made up of six core courses, including the preparation and writing of a master’s thesis, and seven electives. The program supports both fashion-specific topics and interdisciplinary perspectives, reflecting the diverse character of fashion studies and its relationship to other academic disciplines such as sociology, anthropology, design studies, art history, and material culture.

CORE COURSES

In the two core courses taken in the first semester, Fashion Studies—Key Concepts and Fashion, History, and Mediation, students gain a thorough foundation in understanding fashion and its history through analysis of its various visual and material forms, ranging from garments, historic costume books, and fashion photography to movies, magazines, runway shows, and the Internet. They also review and discuss the central debates and concepts that have shaped the development of fashion and fashion studies, such as social class and distinction, gender, subculture and style, production and consumption, cultural identity, and globalization.

In the second semester, students broaden their perspectives by working with international and interdisciplinary experts in the Fashion Cultures lecture course. This course considers key issues such as the link between fashion, modernity, and capitalism; shifts in fashion design practice; the impact of media and technology; the culture economy; and sustainability and ethics. The fourth core course, Interpreting Fashion—Case Studies in Theories and Methodologies, critically reflects on fashion research as practice and process. The course urges students to cross disciplinary boundaries, to engage with fashion’s diverse cultural fields and practices, and to develop new and original perspectives for advanced study in the second year.

Advanced Thesis Preparation, taken in the third semester, assists students in the development of a specific topic and research framework as a solid basis for an in-depth analysis in the fourth semester, which culminates in the writing of the master’s thesis.

ELECTIVES

Core courses are complemented by Fashion Studies electives. Taught by national and international scholars, these courses focus on specific areas of expertise such as the relation of fashion to concepts of the body and beauty; fashion design practice and art; fashion history; museum studies; media and advertising; and fashion and place, which at Parsons means drawing on the rich resources provided by New York City. In addition, a wide range of electives offered in the New School’s various graduate programs provide innovative interdisciplinary opportunities.

PEOPLE

HAZEL CLARK

Dean of the School of Art and Design History and Theory
Parsons The New School for Design

Hazel Clark received her PhD from Brighton Polytechnic, UK. She is a design historian and theorist who has taught internationally and has a particular interest in design and culture and fashion and textiles. Her most recent publications include co-editing Old Clothes, New Looks: Second Hand Fashion (Berg 2005), The Fabric of Cultures: Fashion, Identity and Globalization (Routledge 2009) and Design Studies: A Reader (Berg 2009).

HEIKE JENSS

Director, MA Fashion Studies
School of Art and Design History and Theory
Parsons The New School for Design

Heike Jenss received her PhD in Cultural Anthropology of Textiles from Dortmund University, Germany. Her research concentrates on fashion and consumption as identity practices, youth culture, retro-styles and vintage dress, and the intersection of fashion, individualization, and uniformity. Her book Sixties Dress Only: Mode und Konsum in der Retro-Szene der Mods is based on an ethnographic study of fashion and consumption in the contemporary sixties scene. Further publications include “Fashioning Uniqueness: Mass-Customization and the Commodization of Identity” in Design Studies: A Reader (ed. Clark/ Brody 2009) and “Dressed in History: Retro-Styles and the Construction of Authenticity in Youth Culture” in the journal Fashion Theory.