Undergraduate Module Descriptor

POC3100: The Politics of Fashion

This module descriptor refers to the 2017/8 academic year.

Please note that this module is only delivered on the Penryn Campus.

Module Aims

This module aims to introduce and analyze the political implications of interdisciplinary research on global fashion, considering high-end designer fashion, local independent designers, and global systems of production and consumption. Through this module, you will engage the burgeoning theoretical and empirical research on the political sovereignties, subjectivities, economies, ecologies, and geographies that we enact and contest when we participate in the world of fashion. This module will enable you to analyze critically everyday instantiations of fashion as exemplary of broader challenges in contemporary politics and thus to develop crucial strengths in political analysis across a diverse range of theoretical frameworks and practical contexts.

Intended Learning Outcomes (ILOs)

This module's assessment will evaluate your achievement of the ILOs listed here – you will see reference to these ILO numbers in the details of the assessment for this module.
On successfully completing the programme you will be able to:
Module-Specific Skills1. Describe and critically assess the strengths and weaknesses of central definitions of ‘politics’ developed in fashion research
2. Articulate verbally, creatively, and in writing accurate and insightful accounts of the connections between everyday practices of fashion and global configurations of political relationships.
3. Analyze a particular site of fashion practice as a site of politics, with clear and coherent definitions of key terms and effective integration of theoretical literature.
Discipline-Specific Skills4. Synthesize and critically assess a defined field of political research.
5. Demonstrate through oral and written course work the ability to extend and revise political concepts to account for new fields of theoretical and empirical research.
6. Engage effectively with interdisciplinary research and articulate the significance of this work for analyses of contemporary political life.
Personal and Key Skills7. Work independently and in groups to engage in spontaneous discussion and defence of arguments in class, to prepare presentations for class discussion, and to contribute to a productive classroom.
8. Work independently to research, formulate, write, and present critical analyses that engage a complex mix of theoretical and empirical content.
9. Research, apply, and present your analyses through alternative practices of aesthetic knowledge creation, such as collage, curation, video, or photography.
10. Develop and extend a self-reflexive academic practice that is both independent and collaborative, including: assessing strengths and weaknesses, identifying goals and work plans, integrating feedback, and envisioning future work paths.