Giulia Mensitieri has a doctorate in social anthropology and ethnology from the l’ cole des Hautes tudes en Sciences Sociales (EHESS) in Paris. Her research focuses on globalisation, the transformations of work and the coveted imaginary worlds produced by contemporary capitalism.
Giulia is on the blog today to answer a few questions about her fascinating new book, The Most Beautiful Job in the World – one which draws back fashion’s glamorous facade to explore the lived realities of working in the industry. Read on …
Giulia Mensitieri
Tell us about your book, The Most Beautiful Job in the World.
GM: This book is a re-adaptation of my Ph.D. in social anthropology and ethnology in Paris. It was first published in France in 2018 by La Découverte. It had impressive press coverage all over the world, which is very unusual for academic research. This is because ethnographic writing is very accessible and because the topic speaks to a very heterogeneous audience: fashion workers, fashion lovers, critical thinkers, activists, scholars, but also social workers, NGO workers … and all kinds of cultural and creative workers.
I am very happy because the book as been appropriated by many professionals that have understood how their passions, their creativity, and their lives have been appropriated by capitalism to exploit them. To understand is the first step to transformation.
What drew you to fashion as a writing subject? Do you have a particular love of it or is your interest born of fascination?
GM: As a scholar, I do think that to understand how capitalism penetrates in our every day lives, in our desires, dreams, actions, consumptions, we have to study the places of power. Fashion is one of the richest and most powerful industries globally ramified, spreading products, images, and fantasies all over the world. Yet, as I show in the book, it is an industry based on multiple forms of exploitation. It is, for me a metonymy of capitalism, a field in which you can see all the dynamics that structure it, but amplified by the idea of an exceptional world. That’s why I chose to study fashion!
What do you think we can gain by looking at the fashion industry from an anthropological perspective?
GM: A lot! As I previously said, the fashion industry represents itself as a world of exception, of beauty, luxury, a world outside of the norms. Yet, it’s 6% of global consumption; we estimate that three in 100 work for the garment industry worldwide, it is the second most polluting industry after oil, it’s based on exploitation, particularly female, on strong inequalities, on the extraction of non-western cultures, practices … I mean, it has all the characteristics of capitalism, but because it is considered as a dream, an exceptional world, all these aspects are more visible and so more clearly understandable.
What is the most surprising thing you learnt about the fashion industry while writing and researching this book?
GM: The level of exploitation in the very heart of the power of the industry, the level of acceptance of asymmetries and domination, but also I have been surprised by the professionalism, the knowledge, the techniques of fashion workers. We can think of fashion as a frivolous world, yet it is a world of high professionalism and very hard work.
Where do you see the fashion industry headed, particularly in the post-pandemic age?
GM: Well, I hope that at a personal level we all understand that we need to produce and consume drastically less, to circulate drastically less, to protect resources … which is in total contradiction with the mainstream fashion industry goals which are … profit. The changes we need to survive have to come from the bottom of society; we have to change our dreams and desires, to transform our idea of luxury and glamour, by enchanting the idea of equity, equality, respect of the environment. I do think that the media has a huge responsibility and so an exciting mission, but most of the media is financed by fashion and luxury advertisement, it is difficult to achieve.
What are the initial steps you believe the biggest players in the fashion industry need to take in order to address the issues you raise in your book?
GM: They have to correctly pay all kinds of workers of the system and give them all the rights stipulated by the International Labour Organization. We are very very very far from that, and not only in the sweatshops but also in the creative and glamorous sector of the fashion industry, as I show in my book.
What do you hope readers will get out of this book?
GM: A new vision on fashion, on creativity, on their own work and practices, a tool to reinvest their lives, projections, desires.
And finally, what’s up next for you?
GM: I am still working on the fashion industry, I have opened up the scope and am working on a bigger idea of exploitation that includes the exploitation of the environmental resources in fashion, gender inequalities and postcolonial issues … I still have a lot to do in this industry!
Thanks Giulia!
Thank you, my pleasure, ciao!
—The Most Beautiful Job in the World by Giulia Mensitieri (Melbourne University Press) is out now.
The Most Beautiful Job in the World
Fashion is one of the most powerful industries in the world, accounting for 6 per cent of global consumption and growing steadily. Yet the fashion industry, which claims to offer highly desirable job opportunities, relies significantly on job instability, not just in outsourced garment production but at the very heart of its creative production of luxury.
Based on an in-depth investigation involving stylists, models, designers, hairdressers, make-up artists, photographers and interns, anthropologist Giulia Mensitieri draws back fashion's glamorous facade to explore the lived realities of working in the industry...
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