Written for MASH Magazine Edition IX: Under Fire S24

On August 18, the Roski School of Art and Design unveiled a new addition to their courses: a fashion minor. Beginning in Fall 2023, this interdisciplinary minor, one of four offered at Roski, was made available to undergraduate students. 

The 24-unit minor features courses throughout multiple schools, including the Iovine and Young Academy, the School of Dramatic Arts, the Kaufman School of Dance, the Marshall School of Business and the Annenberg School for Communication and Journalism. 

Applying for the minor is simple; prospective students can fill out an online form before its due date while being currently enrolled or having completed at least one Roski course beforehand. 

To gain further perspective on this new minor, I spoke with Lizzie Lee, a junior majoring in health and human sciences who is now also double minoring in business administration and fashion. 

On why she chose to minor in fashion, Lee said, “I’m interested in working in the business of fashion, specifically merchandising or buying. I thought having the fashion minor combined with my business [administration] minor would give me an advantage over others who were simply one or the other.”

Initially, Lee was drawn toward the communication design minor because of her interest in graphic design and its interdisciplinary curriculum, but then she heard about the Fashion minor. 

“It had more traditional, rather than digital, art and design courses. For example, in the Fashion minor, you can take drawing, costume construction, and dance classes, whereas in Communication Design you can take photography, video, and design courses,” Lee said.

Unfortunately, despite the apparent variety of interdisciplinary courses offered by USC, Lee acknowledged some shortcomings in the minor.

 “A lot of the classes like costume design and the history of fashion are not offered at USC yet, which is disappointing since those are the classes I was excited about,” she said. 

This disappointing lack of variation for fashion studies, despite its overall growing acceptance at universities across the country, is not unique to USC. Even though it is a step forward for USC to establish the fashion minor, it is still not enough for students like Lee. 

“There is just so much information to cover that you really need a full curriculum of fashion courses to understand the industry well,” Lee said. “For instance, in my graphic design in fashion course, we briefly talk about trend research, marketing, textiles and technical drawings, but we don’t really get an in-depth view of these topics. In fashion schools, there are semester-long classes dedicated to these skills.”

With the existence of big-name fashion schools like the Fashion Institute of Technology, Parsons or the Fashion Institute of Design and Merchandising, studying the history and design of fashion has become a popular pathway for students; a fashion minor at USC has been a long time coming. 

Especially in a city like Los Angeles, which is one of the fashion capitals of the United States according to Vogue Australia, competing alongside cities like London, Paris and Milan, fashion has become a powerful tool of self-expression, so the fact that it has taken this long for USC to establish any sort of curriculum for fashion is surprising. In the past year, major brands such as Versace, Chanel and Celine have chosen LA for their runway shows.  

Historically, fashion has been perceived as frivolous or unnecessary, and has also been relegated to a subject only women would care about, resulting in its lack of inclusion at many universities. For example, the Parsons School of Design became the first and only private art and design school to affiliate with a private national university in 1970, when it became a part of the New School.

Despite the importance of fashion toward culture and the economy, fashion’s presence in academia is not representative of its influence due to the misogynistic nature of our society. Because of this gap in fashion education, there is a skills gap in the fashion industry, contributing to less profitability and an overall unsustainable, uncertain retail environment, according to the Business of Fashion.

Furthermore, even though the fashion industry is geared toward women, it is still run by men, with most CEOs of companies being men. Only in 2016 did Dior appoint its first female designer, according to The New York Times. 

The lack of academic programs dedicated to fashion education is harmful not only because of the subsequent skills gap but also because these types of programs are intended to nurture a variety of creative minds. Without a strong academic foundation and fashion becoming normalized at bigger universities, there’s a disparity in creative and technical innovation in the industry. 

Furthermore, since the study of fashion is not taken seriously, important and relevant issues like sustainability or diversity and inclusion in the industry are overlooked. 

While the addition of the fashion minor at USC is a positive step in recognizing the significance of fashion design in society, the study of fashion in academia certainly has a long way to go.

“I honestly think that the fashion minor needs 1 or 2 years to become a fully-fledged program,” Lee said. “I think if anyone wants to apply to the fashion minor, they should remember that USC is not a fashion school, so they should not expect to get in-depth knowledge of either the business or design side of fashion.”