The Fashionable New Yorker: Style, Criticism, and the Dressed Body in Print

• Published in: Fashion theory 2021-01, Vol.25 (1), p.31-52
• Main Author: Jones, Katie Baker
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Criticism; Discourse analysis; discourse studies; Fashion; fashion media
• ISSN: 1362-704X; 1751-7419
• DOI: 10.1080/1362704X.2019.1579447

The New Yorker is a magazine perhaps best known for its cultural commentary on fields such as music, theater, art, film, and television. However, since its founding in 1925, it has also turned its irreverent eye and acerbic wit towards fashion with two issues dedicated to the topic - "Style Issues" - published twice a year. The nature of its fashion discourse, situated as it is among some of the most celebrated political and cultural writings of the day, is the subject here. A text analysis of ten "Style Issues" offers opportunity to explore fashion discourse and criticism outside the traditional realm of the fashion media landscape. While it is not a venue often considered under the heading "fashion media," The New Yorker's long history of positioning fashion reporting as of interest to their readership offers a new space in which to deconstruct how tangential, yet relevant, media spaces engage with this multifarious cultural product. The magazine's literary/narrative approach was less about offering assessment and more concerned with creating an emotional connection for the reader. Though style and fashion served as a frame of reference, emphasis remained on the human experience of dressed bodies and their interaction in a broader socio-political context.