When Fashion Forgets Its Roots
On the world’s biggest runway platform, models walk in their stunning outfits dripping with vibrant and colorful beads, feathers, and intricate embroideries. These patterns originated from indigenous tribes who have sentimental and cultural values attached to it, yet there are no acknowledgements or appreciation given to them. The designers hold their heads high with pride, savoring all the praise and glory. But what about the centuries of stories that have been reduced to a mere showcase of aesthetic clothings?
Even appropriating “bindi”, a South Asian accessory, into a Coachella fashion statement, chunni, a South Asian cloth that symbolizes a women’s honor and dignity, into a meaningless scarf, the endless parade of celebrities like Bella and Gigi Hadid in box braids or dreadlocks has led to a mass consumption of this inappropriateness in a way that the cultural or religious significance has deemed insignificant. Erasure of centuries of culture history into a fleeting aesthetic and commodification has stripped these apparels of struggles, rituals and meanings, rendering them weightless. Marginalized subcultures are largely ignored but when the mainstream starts to embrace the same style or trend, the origin is mostly disregarded by the consumers and the designers. How is this anything short of theft? ….a colonization over someone's culture and society and profiting off of that.
For years now, Victoria’s Secret has been known for being notorious in cultural appropriation. From targeting indigenous people with body art (on the left) to models of non-Chinese descent—Adriana Lima, Elsa Hosk, and Lais Ribeiro—wearing Asian-inspired clothes with heritage value featuring a feathered Chinese dragon wrapping her waist and back and knot tassels (on the right) to scanty lingerie. Season after season, Victoria’s Secret continues to exhibit its controversial collection despite the backlash they face… and it doesn’t look like it is stopping anytime soon.
Even Loewe in its Spring/Summer 2018 collection was called out for cultural appropriation when they failed to credit Ecuador's indigenous craftspeople for the beautiful textile patterns they used in their collection, especially with two women in white hats. It was only after Diet Prada, a popular Instagram account and a fashion “watchdog”, exposed this atrocity on their platform that led the creative director of Loewe Jonathan Anderson to apologize and honor the artisans’ craftsmanship.
Unfortunately, cultural appropriation is not a new phenomenon in fashion. Luxurious brands often fail to understand that fashion is a conversation, some would say “a love language”, between two cultures. Textures, colors, cultures, and even histories travel across continents and evolve over centuries to become products of shared creativity and authenticity. But the problem arises when this mutual partnership turns into a one-way transaction where brands exploit marginalized populations for the sake of claiming ownership over their designs. This turns what was once meaningful and culturally significant into monopolistic and hollow trends.
How do these big fashion houses conveniently forget to give the recognition and only do so if there is a backlash? At what point does artistic admiration become cultural appropriation?
The grey line between cultural appreciation and appropriation might be easy to miss, but it exists and it matters not only for the fashion businesses, but also to those of“unheard” societies.Beyond functioning as wearable items, these clothes also symbolize respect and revere for their cultural or religious origins. When Gucci featured white models in turbans and priced it for $790 at Nordstrom in 2018, the Sikh community was outraged to learn that something so pious and sacred to them had been turned into a monetized item without engaging with the Sikh coalition.
Proper cultural appreciation requires respect, collaboration, and understanding, whereas appropriation constitutes the act of borrowing ideas without permission from communities who were discriminated against for expressing the very identities that were “borrowed”.
Researchers say that cultural appropriation targets the conversation of racism and classism more than appropriation itself. Appropriation makes the efforts of labourers completely invisible and it is extremely unfair. Even in the 21st century, despite the world’s progress, the fashion industry stands still in its conservative era because of its domination by white men for centuries. If this industry struggles to even acknowledge the marginalized society for its contribution, how can we expect to see designers from these underrepresented societies to flourish in the fashion industry?
