Gênero e moda: a construção da aparência na prática de cross-dressing

Abstract

Grounded by the social sciences field, this thesis has as its investigation theme, the relation between gender and fashion, through the perspective guided by media regarding transgenderism. Instigated by the role of appearance build by the use of aesthetics signs, the theoretical restlessness is stablished on the notion of the body in a permanent bargain with the established models, according to the gender designated at birth. This study investigates the principles of the fashion system inserted in gender studies, which proposes to create a panorama of body and its relative identity from clothing experiences, and those, guided by the instances of material culture. The thesis also focus on if such subjects, labeled as masculine and that transit on the dimensions of gender through personal aesthetic choices that conventionally belong to women’s universe, projects a feminine archetype for their visual production. Therefore, it starts from an exploratory research, encompassing an interdisciplinary bibliographic revision to generate the connection points between the main knowledge areas: social sciences, gender studies, consume anthropology and aesthetic notions; associated with a field research, on which the empirical universe is constituted by transgenders from the association Brazilian Cross-dresser Club, as well as by interlocutors that identify themselves through this practice, besides the collection of reports shared on biographies and social networks. Through this investigation, one of the main results achieved is the validation of the importance given to visual language, when exerted by an angle of observation of the social speech in which gender classification s binary. On this space of expression and negotiation with the environment, the practice of cross-dressing gives a new size to the social effects, since it takes the personal image to a new hierarchy within the political dimension, in a process of constant struggle for recognition.