Modest Fashion

Increasing numbers of women are engaging in the development and discussion of modest dressing; a movement matched by a growing media and popular demand for intelligent commentary about the topic. Modest Fashion sets out to meet that need. As a trend, modest dressing is spreading across the world, yet it is rarely viewed as 'fashion'. Studying consumers and producers, retailers and bloggers, Modest Fashion provides an up to the minute account of the art of dressing modestly - and fashionably. Leading scholars in the area, along with journalists, fashion designers, entrepreneurs and bloggers discuss the emergence of a niche market for modest fashion among and between Jewish, Christian and Muslim faith groups as well as secular dressers. Crossing creeds and cultures, analysing commentary alongside commerce, the book probes the personal and the political as well as religious, aesthetic and economic implications of contemporary dress practices and the debates that surround them.

Increasing numbers of women are engaging in the development and discussion of modest dressing; a movement matched by a growing media and popular demand for intelligent commentary about the topic. Modest Fashion sets out to meet that need.As a trend, modest dressing is spreading across the world, yet it is rarely viewed as 'fashion'. Studying consumers and producers, retailers and bloggers, Modest Fashion provides an up to the minute account of the art of dressing modestly - and fashionably.Leading scholars in the area, along with journalists, fashion designers, entrepreneurs and bloggers discuss the emergence of a niche market for modest fashion among and between Jewish, Christian and Muslim faith groups as well as secular dressers. Crossing creeds and cultures, analysing commentary alongside commerce, the book probes the personal and the political as well as religious, aesthetic and economic implications of contemporary dress practices and the debates that surround them.

Modest fashion is a young, fast-growing, multi-billion-dollar retail sector. What do we mean by Modest Fashion? Who are the personalities and companies driving this industry?

Tailored for fashion students and equally relevant for fashion professionals, Pioneering New Perspectives in the Fashion Industry: Disruption, Diversity and Sustainable Innovation presents a ground-breaking, comprehensive and cutting-edge analysis of the challenges and opportunities reshaping the global fashion industry.

Turkey has witnessed remarkable sociocultural change under the regime of Recep Tayyip Erdogan and his Justice and Development Party (AKP), particularly regarding its religious communities. As individuals with pious identities have increasingly gained access to state power and accumulated economic influence, so religious appearances and practices have become more visible in Turkey's `secular' public spaces. More than this, consumption practices have changed and new Islamic and Islamist identities have emerged. This book investigates three of the most widespread faith-inspired communities in Turkey: the Gulen, Suleymanli and the Menzil. Nazli Alimen compares these communities, looking at their diverse interpretations of Islamic rules related to the body and dress, and how these different groups compete for power and control in Turkey. In tracing what motivates consumption practices, the book adds to the growing interest in the commercial aspects of modest and Islamic fashion. It also highlights the importance of clothing and bodily rituals (such as veiling, grooming and food choices) for the formation of community identities. Based on ethnographic research, Alimen analyses the relationship between the marketplace and religion, and shows how different communities interact with each other and state institutions. Of particular note are the varied expressions of Islamic masculinities and femininities at play. Appealing to a cross-disciplinary readership, the book will be relevant for scholars within Turkish Studies, Gender Studies, Islamic Studies, Fashion, Consumption Studies, Sociology of Religion and Middle Eastern Studies.

This book investigates ways of dressing, style and fashion as gendered and embodied, but equally as “religionized” phenomena, particularly focusing on one significant world religion: Islam. Through their clothing, Muslims negotiate concepts and interpretations of Islam and construct their intersectionally interwoven position in the world. Taking the interlinkages between ‘fashionized religion,’ ‘religionized fashion,’ commercialization and processes of feminization as a starting point, this book reshapes our understanding of gendered forms of religiosity and spirituality through the lens of gender and embodiment. Focusing mainly on the agency and creativity of women as they appropriate ways of performing and interpreting various modalities of Muslim clothing and body practices, the book investigates how these social actors deal with empowering conditions as well as restrictive situations. Foregrounding contemporary scholars’ diverse disciplinary, theoretical and methodological approaches, this book problematizes and complicates the discursive and lived interactions and intersections between gender, fashion, spirituality, religion, class, and ethnicity. It will be relevant to a broad audience of researchers across gender, sociology of religion, Islamic and fashion studies.

Marketing in the emerging Islamic markets is a challenging business function since international companies must contend with unfamiliar customs, cultural differences, and legal challenges. This book provides marketers who want to reach this emerging and very lucrative consumer base with essential, research-based insights on these aspects and how to deal with them. This book redefines marketing practice and conduct and challenges conventional marketing wisdom by introducing a religious-based ethical framework to the practice of marketing. The framework opens a whole new array of marketing opportunities and describes the behavior of the consumer, community, and companies using a different approach than conventional marketing thought.

Media discourse is changing at an unprecedented rate. This book presents the most recent stylistic frameworks exploring different and changed forms of media. The volume collates recent and emerging research in the expanding field of media stylistics, featuring a variety of methods, multimodal source material, and a broad range of topics. From Twitter and Zooniverse to Twilight and Mommy Blogs, the volume maps out new intellectual territory and showcases a huge scope, neatly drawn together by leading scholars Helen Ringrow and Stephen Pihlaja. Contributors write on topics that challenge the traditional notions and conceptualisations of "media" and the consequences of technological affordances for the development of media production and consumption. There is a particular focus on the ways in which contemporary media contexts complicate and challenge traditional media models, and offer new and unique ways of approaching discourse in these contexts.