frfashion1-5, Exercise 1: "The New Look liberated women from wartime austerity"

Model answer (check the details), using the six questions:

1. Who says it? Fashion writers, Dior's house and some historians; critics say the opposite.
2. What exactly is claimed? Two things: that the New Look ended austerity (an economic claim) and that it liberated women (a social claim). "Liberated" is the weak point.
3. What would count as evidence? Rationing records, cloth supplies and prices, sales figures, what women said and wrote at the time, the reaction of the press and of women's organisations, and the numbers of women wearing the style.
4. Compared with what? The plain Utility clothes in Britain, the French wartime dress, and the prewar fashions of 1938 and 1939 that anticipated the style.
5. Which period? 1947 to the mid-1950s, since austerity lasted longer in some countries than in others.
6. What would change my mind? Evidence that few women could afford or chose the style, or that women's roles changed little.

Verdict: the New Look restored glamour and made Paris the centre of fashion again, but austerity continued for some years and rationing in Britain lasted until 1949 (check). "Liberated" is too strong: the style was restricting in form (a tight waist and heavy skirts) and was also criticised as returning women to a decorative role, though many women welcomed it. A careful sentence: "The New Look gave Paris fashion a new direction after the war and divided opinion on what it meant for women."

Care: do not decide what women felt from the writings of designers and editors alone.