JOIN USClothes are an important part of self-expression. The notion of what looks good and what doesn’t evolves all the time. College campuses form an ideal ramp on which one can watch changing fashion. “When the film Qayamat Se Qayamat was released, the girls started wearing white salwar kameez and bandini dupattas, like Juhi Chawla wore in the movie. When Aashiqui came, net ribbon became a rage among the girls. This has always happened,” says Noureen Aziz, a lecturer at Jyoti Nivas College, when asked if students emulate pop culture.
If it was Bollywood movies at one time, it’s shows like Gossip Girl and One Tree Hill now that influence the young adults. Why, you wonder? “We don’t want to look like older people. You want to have a college life like it’s shown in these serials,” comes the answer from Tania Jones, a student of Christ College.
So, if everybody is watching the same shows and picking up fashion trends from them, what happens to the idea of self-expression?
“Well, like in Gossip Girl, where they all wear uniforms to school but they all do it differently. You pick up things and do it your own way,” is Jones’ answer. Asked if all the kids on campus dress the same way, she said, “You know, it may sound bad but how there is a class difference in society, similarly there’s one in college also. You usually make friends with people who dress alike.”
If this is about assimilation, then that seems to worry Sudha, a counsellor, who confesses that this is a strange trend saying that by 18, kids start to express themselves and form groups based on other core values. A view that is seconded by Etienne Rassendran, a professor at St Joseph’s College, “I haven’t seen peer groups dictated by fashion.” He is of the opinion that they band together based on things like music, books and other common interests. However, there are students who spend anything between Rs 2,000 and Rs 20 thousand a month on clothes and shop regularly. “I have a friend who doesn’t like to repeat clothes to a party. We party twice a month,” says Ivy, a student from JNC, confessing she’s a shopaholic. Sudha is of the opinion that this is a bit too much and parents need to put a stop to this. Colleges have students coming from different background and they are considered to be places where differences based on things like clothes do not exist.
Divya, a student from JNC puts this debate to bed saying, “Sure there is a handful of girls who are into fashion and only hang out with others like them. But while the number of us interested in fashion has increased, it’s never like we wouldn’t be friends with anybody else. It’s not like the mean girls on American shows.”