American Identity: Culture, Fashion and Sustainability

https://kent-islandora.s3.us-east-2.amazonaws.com/ugresearch/2018/2018all/29/thumbnail.jpg“American Identity: Culture, Fashion and Sustainability” is a study identifying and defining American fashion based on qualitative case study conducted since 2016. Through primary research including observations, interviews, and surveys, and secondary research, I found that America is a melting pot with each culture having its own identity and lacking interconnection among them. The thread that binds them all is fashion, as it morphs many aspects of society and is the bond in terms of communication, religion, symbolism and social identity. Research conducted in India, Germany, and America reveal how culture and fashion are innately related. However, it is the same fashion industry formed in the United States that is destroying the culture in the name of fast fashion. The solution is to introduce sustainable fashion into businesses. My passion behind this research is based off of revealing how the fast fashion industry is destructive on a global scale and has been based on my research questions:What is American fashion? How has identity and culture been affected by dress and the fashion industry? Why does the United States, despite knowing the path we are taking in terms of fashion, we are not addressing this issue as a developed nation? How can the US be a “melting pot” yet be unable to accept other cultures based on their individual clothing identity? The preliminary findings are if the United States were to make sustainable fashion as mainstream as fast fashion is, then cultures and identity would be celebrated rather than consumerism.