PMA 3616 - The Body of Fashion: A Head-to-Toe Journey through the History of Western Dress

(HB) (LA-AS)

Fall. 3 credits. Student option grading.

S. Bernstein.

This course explores the evolution of western dress from the time of the ancient Egyptians to the early twentieth century by focusing on areas of the human anatomy and how each area has been presented, comported, supported, augmented, confined, or manipulated in costume. Rather than indulging in the strange, we will endeavor to come to an understanding of the motivation for each gesture or the catalyst for each phenomenon in the context of the period, taking into consideration social, political, economic, environmental, technological, and aesthetic influences. (DE)