Critical analysis of fashion discourse based on Laclau's and Mouffe's theory: Transition from Conspicuous consumption to creative consumption.

According to Veblen, fashion is conspicuous consumption. That is, it is a means of showing off the social class.The most important characteristic of fashion is its changing nature. It means that the reduction of prestige value of fashion leads to the death of fashion and the appearance of new fashion. The reason for this constant change and renewal of fashion is in the behind of the concept of need for conspicuous consumption. Consequently, the fashion industry has counter-cultural effect named consumerism. Conspicuous consumption is nodal point of fashion discourse, and discourse articulation is strengthened in conjunction with the other elements which are around it. Fashion discourse educates subjects that are women and act in the direction of consumerism or materialism. It is obvious truth that the relationship between fashion and high-volume consumption conflicts with sustainability goals. Because, overconsumption of clothes leads to more waste, more pollution and more sustainable issues. Consumerism has caused serious, long-term environmental, social, and economic damages, and subsequently sustainable development discourse has been revealed to counteract or mitigate these problems. Since the 1980s, by the advent of the discourse of sustainable development, the discourse of fashion has been pushed to the margins. The main aim of this research work is critical discourse analysis of fashion and Survey on transformation of consumption signifier from Fashion Discourse to Sustainable Development Discourse. The research method is based on Laclau's and Mouffe's discourse theory. The two questions we are facing are: Firstly, what is the meaning of “consumption” in fashion discourse, and secondly, how semantic change of "consumption" signifier has happened from fashion discourse to sustainable development discourse. Today's the most important approaches that are used as a method in the field of social sciences are: Positivism, interpretive, and critical. Among the critical approaches, Laclau and Mouffe's theory of discourse has received more attention. The theory of Discourse Analysis, which was born in linguistics, have developed in the best way by Laclau and Mouffe in the field of culture, society and politics. They emphasize on the discursive nature of all social domains. Therefore, this theory can be used to explain the phenomenon of fashion and the discourses in it. This research is done in a qualitative way and through the method of Laclau's and Mouffe's discourse analysis. In it, the concepts related to the mechanism of conventional fashion system and sustainable fashion system are extracted. To collect the data, the study has used the library method of data collection. Finally, after discovering all the discourse’s signifiers, the discourse components of conventional fashion are analyzed one by one from the point of view of sustainable fashion discourse. Finally, the conceptual model of fashion discourse, which is criticized by sustainable fashion discourse, is presented along with all the components of discourse and their relationships. Creative consumption can be considered as an empty sign in the fashion discourse from two points of view: Need Theory – Value. If a higher economic value and less of cultural value create a need for some kinds of garment, those garments are classified at the lower level of the needs pyramid, and vice versa. Hence the pyramid of need for garment from the bottom to up will be: clothing - general fashion - high fashion - sustainable fashion. There is the greatest cultural value in sustainable fashion, which meets the consumer's need for self-actualization through creativity. For this reason, the consumers are willing to pay more for sustainable fashion than other types of clothing, and therefore the economic value in it will be in lowest level. So the reason for the changing in fashion, and willingness to pay, is value. Value is a multiple signifier which is reduced to a prestige value in the fashion discourse. In sustainable fashion discourse, value is in the line with ethics, altruism, and creativity. Consumers will only be inclined to accept sustainable products when they are satisfied with deeper values. Sustainability adds value to the brand. The value of sustainable fashion consists of four elements: environment - stakeholder management - economic value and growth potential - innovation and creativity. Sustainability is an opportunity for innovation, and sustainable luxury goods have three dimensions of value: social-cultural value, individual value, and environmental value. The results show that the fashion discourse has an empty signifier which is creative consumption. Creative consumption is derived from the semantic transformation of nodal point of fashion discourse and has become nodal point in sustainable development discourse. In fact, the sustainable fashion discourse is emerged to fill the gaps in the discourse of conventional fashion, and its mission is to reduce the environmental, economic and social harms of consumerism. The proposed conceptual model of fashion discourse shows that how and by what indicators of sustainable fashion discourse, each of the indicators of conventional fashion discourse criticized, and finally how conventional fashion discourse loses its discourse power. The most important discursive weaknesses and fluctuations in fashion discourse are due to the fact that the subject becomes a passive consumer who has conspicuous consumption in her shopping behavior. So consumption in the sustainable development discourse means "creative consumption" and sustainable fashion discourse, which is the dominant discourse in the new era, fills the gaps in fashion discourse with creative consumption as central signifier to stabilize power relations and breaks the hegemony of competing discourses. The subject that sustainable development discourse with "creative consumption" nodal point makes is an ethical and creative consumer, whose most important concern is reduction of consumption, and tendency to sustainable creative consumption or authentic consumption. In the semantic fixation processes of creative consumption, backgrounding of conspicuous consumption and sustainable development hegemony happen. The hegemony of sustainable fashion revival versus the death of fashion, and the hegemony of creative consumption versus conspicuous consumption is the result of dislocation of fashion discourse articulation through sustainable development .Eventually, the discourse of sustainable development comes to power as dominant discourse. Sustainable fashion’s mission is reduction the environmental, economic and social harm of consumerism. In this way, the creative consumer is emerged in the sustainable fashion discourse which works in in line with the vision and goals of sustainability. In sustainable development discourse creative consumption means fashion revival, which can be accomplished in three primary ways: 1) Reusing of clothing, through donation, or resale and second-hand clothing, even by ecommerce; 2) Repairing clothes or replacing parts of it; 3) Recycling clothing materials to create new clothes. In this way, a creative consumer, will feel more interest to his product and will be able to implement sustainability in his lifestyle in the best way, because he plays an important role in stabilizing the fashion he uses. Thus, the passive consumer of the fashion discourse, which is a tool for the capitalism and the commercial goals of the fashion industry, becomes the active creative consumer in the sustainable fashion discourse.