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A contribution to: Scrutinizing Beauty

Edited by Eleanor Dobson and Daisy Gudmunsen

MHRA Working Papers in the Humanities 12

Modern Humanities Research Association

open

Abstract.  How did elegance, from being a privilege of aristocracy, acquire inclusive meaning across socially and culturally diverse contexts? Furthermore, as a form of beauty, what impact did it have on broader socio-cultural developments, and by which means? The concept of elegance was popularized in the nineteenth century through fashion magazines, whose commercial purpose and transnational character determined the way it was shaped and diffused. Simultaneously, since one of the periodical press’s functions is to provide readers with the sense of belonging to a particular group, fashion magazines’ emphasis on elegance entailed the development of imagined communities symbolically related to this concept. By referring to the Russian fashion periodical Modnyi magazin (1862–83), I present, firstly, how commercialization and transnationalization of the fashion press became the driving factors for the elaboration of the inclusive notion of elegance as related to Parisian fashion but not limited to it. Secondly, I demonstrate how this editorial concept influenced readers’ social habitus and helped to shape new forms of social affiliation beyond class-related and national borders.

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