Major Project: Cultural Appropriation and the Fashion Industry

African themed editorial in Vogue Italia

 
 The second fashion photography trope i am looking at is cultural appropriation, the act of a dominant culture using aspects of another culture which usually perpetuate and reinforce stereotypes about that culture. This is a good article about the problems with cultural appropriation on Everyday Feminism.

When it comes to fashion photography magazines often reference African cultures under the umbrella term of 'tribal'. Vogue magazine has come under fire for editorials that show white models in face paint and graphic prints posing with African animals and Vogue Netherlands has been in trouble twice for using blackface, painting a white models skin darker for an editorial called 'African Queen'. This has trickled down into everyday fashion with bindis and henna being worn as fashion accessories and native American war bonnets being worn by hipsters at music festivals.

White model Lara Stone in French Vogue

Pharrell Williams in a war bonnet for Elle UK, Williams later apologized

Im looking at cultural appropriation because it ties into the idea of Scottish history being written by those who came across the ancient Scots, The Picts way of life being lost as they adopted the traditions of the Gaels and the way people view Scotland today. It reminds me of this quote by Alexander McQueen:

'Scotland for me is a harsh, cold and bitter place. It was even worse when my great, great grandfather used to live there. The reason I’m patriotic about Scotland is because I think it’s been dealt a really hard hand. It’s marketed the world over as . . . haggis . . . bagpipes. But no one ever puts anything back into it.'

Image from Rachel Maclean's I Heart Scotland, looking at stereotypes of Scotland in a fun, tongue in cheek way

My idea is to create a series of fashion images exploring the idea of Scotland and Scottish culture being popular with hipsters, how it would be boiled down to its most basic stereotypes and fashion items being used to represent an entire group of people. As annoying as the tartan, haggis and bagpipes stereotypes are i dont think they have quite the negative impact as blackface and acting like you can represent an entire continent with a 'look'. But i think using Scotland i can really over the top and discuss cultural appropriation (and at times blatant racism) in fashion editorials without having to use African countries or any 'exotic' eastern cultures as a prop. After all, another problem people have with hipsters and the fashion industry is their appropriation of the working class and obsession with poverty. There is an article about why the appropriation of working class culture is a bad thing here on Complex and why it isnt a bad thing here on Hypebeast. Poverty is a problem in Scotland and i want these images to represent that as well as the way the fashion industry is infatuated with glamourising that and misrepresenting cultures in the same way they miss the mark with domestic violence.