Initial status value shapes whether a fashion becomes tradition

Evidence

An item’s or practice’s initial status value may also have bearing on whether it becomes a custom or tradition. A major trend for women in 2004 was thong underwear “with straps worn high over the hips, exposed by fashionable low-rise jeans and Juicy Couture sweat pants.” From what we’ve learned, is this look likely to be maintained as a long-term American tradition? — W. David Marx, Status and Culture, 808

Categorization

• XREF: connects to: Marginal figures more naturally produce radical symbolic invention — W. David Marx, Status and Culture: How Our Desire for…, 828; Shrinking subcultures grow more extreme as core members chase escalating status — W. David Marx, Status and Culture: How Our Desire for…, 426; Status acts as an automated motor driving permanent cultural change — W. David Marx, Status and Culture: How Our Desire for…, 27 (+3 more)

Broader Connections

• Some audiences seek stable tradition rather than ironic self-fashioning #responds-to (0.85) — Nina Eliasoph, Avoiding politics, 918
• Classic forms resist fashion because they lack points of attack for change #corroborates (0.80) — Georg Simmel, on individuality and social forms_…, 745