19세기 프랑스 부르주아(Bourgeois)의 패션에 나타난 모방 욕망 특성에 관한 연구 -르네 지라르의 모방 욕망이론의 관점에서-

Abstract

The Purpose of this study is to examine mimetic desires and to find their characteristics in bourgeois fashion through the relations between social classes, which led the French social, economic, and cultural trends in the 19th century. This study will be meaningful in uncovering the importance of fashion in the context of social dimensions and in reexamining the imitations and differentiations which causes the constantly changing fashions of today. French sociologist and literature critic Réne Girard tried to explain dynamics of human relations through the imitation principle. Girard called human desires generated by imitation “désir mimétique”. It is meaningful to examine the imitation desires that appeared among the French bourgeois, particularly in their fashion in the 19th century, in relation to the various social classes surrounding them. Therefore, we examined the imitation desire between the noble and the bourgeois, between the bourgeois and the proletariat, between the bourgeois and demi-monde, and between bourgeois men and women. We found that imitation desire was motivated not only by esthetic aspiration but also by longing for the “power” that those imitation desires targeted. This study is a framework for analyzing various types of imitation desires in modern society, and the implication of this study is that the perspective of fashion is broadened to the psychosocial field by applying the imitation desire theory which is increasingly used in current studies of fashion.