Yu Lun Eve Lin

In this PhD research project, I utilise autobiographical narratives which present my lived experiences as a school pupil, fashion design student, professional designer and academic lecturer. These texts are complemented by library research around key figures and situations relating to the narratives. Fashion education raises issues of power relations and cultural differences in both academic delivery and professional practice. Autoethnography has assisted me in investigating the role of ‘self’ in fashion education at elite institutions and in the fashion industry, offering insights into the experiences of being an Asian student studying art and design at UK universities.

The methods that underpin this research are evocative autoethnography and discourse analysis. I have selected a mixed-method approach as this has enabled me to integrate subjective and objective data in order to examine the key issues that arise for Eastern learners experiencing Western fashion design education. The narratives describe critical moments within industry settings and educational learning in higher education studio contexts in London and Taipei. The inclusion of contextual information, primarily from fashion journalism and educational texts, has helped to contextualise these narratives and relate the personal experiences they contain to wider social frames.

The analysis is built on two key theoretical concepts: Bourdieu’s theory of cultural capital and symbolic violence and Foucault’s concept of power. I have utilised binary frameworks: teaching versus learning, professional versus amateur, and success versus failure in order to draw out some initial insights. This examination leads to the consideration of a key question: what do Asian students need from UK fashion education providers? This reflective exercise explores the implications of the initial interrogations of the autoethnographic narratives and demonstrates the wider relevance of these findings. Finally, the study provides some insights and reflections into the role of the pedagogical practice of power within fashion education and the fashion industry and how the cultural differences identified in the study impact on Asian students’ learning in the UK fashion education system.

Keywords: autoethnography, narrative, fashion design, fashion education, power.