Traversing the Matriarch's Domain: How Young Men Negotiate the Feminized Space of Fashion Consumption and Self-Presentation

Purpose – To explore how young men negotiate the matriarchal domain of fashion consumption and self-presentation, observing techniques adopted by these men to navigate this feminized space and construct their identity project. Methodology/approach – Engaging Foucauldian theory, a constructionist approach is followed to analyze qualitative interview data with the understanding that a consumer's narrated experience is embedded in a social web of possible interpretation. Rather than seeking to discover a respondents “essential self” within interview data, this research takes a narrative analysis approach, considering individuals storytelling within the context of circulating discourses and power relations. Findings – As young, fashion-forward men navigate new configurations of power relationships and adopt new modes of performing masculinity, they come to legitimate themselves by forging new categories of existence. They engage various techniques to include the arts and the art of irony in an effort to constitute their masculine subjectivity within discourses of fashionable self-presentation practices. Social implications – By exploring the social context wherein consumer choices are made, we see consumer identity projects are in fact constricted and influenced by a myriad of sociocultural forces. Originality/value of paper – Within consumer culture theory, there is much focus on the agency of consumers and their identity projects. However, there is a dearth of work that considers the social and cultural context wherein these identity constructions take place. This study makes a contribution toward addressing this gap.