Repros and the Japanese Identity

[slowdownarthur]

If you want to explore the problematics of the perception of Japanese culture from a Western point of view you may find Steve Beard's essay in 'Logic Bomb' interesting. (Serpents Tail '98)

He questions why a host of commentators, from Roland Barthes and William Klein onwards 'insist on seeing Japan as a metaphor for the postmodern condition'. His research begins with a quote from Glimpses of Unfamiliar Japan, a late C19 text that is rich in this exoticised vision of Japan as Other.

Jean Baudrillard is worth exploring in his examination of our preoccupation with reproduction and the relationship between the copy and the original. I imagine that if you're looking at Hebdige you're already familiar with Baudrillard though.

I'm really enjoying this thread on sufu - and looking forward to reading your paper...thanks for sparking such a creative thread...

[lmaozedong]

Keep in mind that I'm a Biology major, not a fashion theorist or even an English major.. so probably my essay won't go into the kind of depth that you guys are expecting or necessarily would want. However, I am slightly familiar with Baudrillard, but from what I've read of Baudrillard the argument he makes about copies (funny that you mention this, because I wrote my previous essay on Walter Benjamin's The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction) not being distinguish from the original--or rather, it is not relavent whether it is a copy or not--because of the ease of making copies and its complete prevalence is not really relavent to my essay. I'm not so much writing about the idea of making copies but the idea of the differentiations you can make in reusing and appropriating ideas and in this case, pieces of clothing from other cultures. Thus it is in the differentiation that I find signifcance, not the process of making the copy itself. Maybe you're speaking about a different essay from what I read about Baudrillard, however.

Anyway, I'll post a brief outline of what I'm planning on writing soon, but I'm afraid that you will be disappointed in the sense that I don't go in depth or as theoretical as maybe you would expect looking at this thread. Rather, I see repros as an illustration of the way in which identity is established through difference and as a rough illustration of the way that post-war Japanese identity has been re-established. Still not sure about the post-war stuff though. I do feel that Japanese identity is expressed through the differences in repro jeans from the originals. I have sources that say that denim (not necessarily vintage, or repros) started becoming popular in Japan pretty much right with the end of World War II...

"Around that same time (1950s-60s) Japan's biggest jeans makers were also prewashing, including Big John, the country's raditional workwear brand. Japanese prewashing was a direct result of consumer demand. Aficionados were accustomed to the soft hand of the used jeans left behind by American GIs from World War II. The popularity of that resale business inspired the rise of Japan's own blue jeans industry in the 1960s..."-Jeans, by James Sullivan

[slowdownarthur]

Yeah, I can see Baudrillard's not quite what you're after...

Funny you mention Benjamin though,because Hebdige opens "Towards a Cartography of Taste' with a great quote from The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction and I was going to mention that too. Its a research article on design history and popular culture written for an art and design journal. Its in a section called Taste, Nation and Popular Culture in 'Hiding in the Light (1988) and 'attempts to map out the various responses to imported American goods between 1935 -62' in Britain.

I really don't mean to weigh you down with expectations or over extend your reading list, you've actually got me going looking digging through my books though...

[lmaozedong]

So today, while talking about this topic over dinner with my girlfriend, I decided that I may change the focus of my paper. As I pondered the fact that, despite available differentiations, repro jeans that try and imitate original American jeans to the exact detail still persist, and I thought that that fact contains more meaning than analyzing the differentiation itself. I wrote down the following thoughts about the meaning of repro jeans:

Even though the repro jeans that the Japanese produce try and replicate the original American jeans as closely as they possibly can, they have taken on a new meaning. Although the product remains the same, the existence of reproductions of jeans in Japanese culture is entirely different in its significance and value in the context of Japanese cultural values and identity. Differentiation, and therefore identity is thus not achieved through the inherent properties of an object of fashion, but rather through differentiation of the views toward the object. And so, within the context of ever-shifting cultural values and views, it is impossible for an object in a global context to maintain a static meaning.

So as you can see, the topic of my paper has pretty much completely shifted from the differences to the meaning in the similarities. I still may talk about the ways in which the Japanese have differentiated the repro as a demonstration of what elements of the original jean that the Japanese denim industry values (as opposed to the very different values that have driven the American denim industry), but the focus will be on the meaning of creating a replica of the jean.

Basically, I'm going to say that the Japanese take value in the elements of the repro (and also by association, vintage) that demonstrate the aesthetic of wabi sabi, and that the single-mindedness with which the Japanese denim producers have tried to replicate denim infers new meanings to an old object. While the physical properties of the repro jeans become closer and closer to the original, the meaning that they carry diverges more and more.

Given that I'm pretty much shifting my topic completely, any input/readings that I should do on this topic would be greatly, greatly appreciated.

[poopslush]

Good look on your project and I'm looking forward to seeing it.

I'm not sure if anyone else has suggested it, but you might want to look into the development of the Osaka 5. From my understanding, japanese denimheads were (and still are) devoted to vintage and deadstock denim brought over from the US. It wasn't until the osaka 5 companies came about that anyone was really making repro denim... did they start thier companies because of the culture of the time? lack of available vintage denim? economics? I think you could do a lot on this topic. Also consider how most of the "old school" repro companies (fullcount, SDA, etc) generally stick to strict reproductions, while newer companies (Oni, Samurai, etc) keep the tradtional cuts and details while doing a lot more creative work with the dyeing process, weaving, etc.

[ringring]

.I'm going to say that the Japanese take value in the elements of the repro (and also by association, vintage) that demonstrate the aesthetic of wabi sabi, and that the single-mindedness with which the Japanese denim producers have tried to replicate denim infers new meanings to an old object. While the physical properties of the repro jeans become closer and closer to the original, the meaning that they carry diverges more and more.

Given that I'm pretty much shifting my topic completely, any input/readings that I should do on this topic would be greatly, greatly appreciated.

.

.

As Lysander declares, in a Shakespearean reference to Wabi Sabi , "the course of true love never did run smooth" - it's good to see how your thoughts have changed course and evolved.

You may want to look at the ingredients involved in jeans production, ie. Cotton, spinning, weaving, dyeing and sewing and how they play a part in your paper.

Here's a few ideas. My history knowledge, as ever, is patchy, so please chip in and amend.

Old world cotton cultivation is usually credited as originating, as with so many things, in India. Muslin named from city of Mosul, Iraq, where young girls spun the cotton (from that activity comes the origins of the word, Spinster), was famed as the cloth that enveloped the Buddha when he achieved Enlightenment.

And, like Buddhism, it arrived in Japan via China, where the conquering Mongols had encouraged the cultivation of the 'vegetable lamb'. The Chinese invention of the heddle loom about 3000 years earlier, and used for silk, was readily put to use into weaving cotton.

Cotton cultivation developed in the Edo period (1603-1868), grown as a cash crop in was is the Nara prefecture, just east of Osaka spreading rapidly west as the working class began to replace their traditional linen/hemp (Asa) clothing with cotton.

This mirrors the boom of the cotton industry following the Industrial Revolution in Europe and USA. Incidentally the cultivation of the natural indigo (Ai) also peaks during this period - see Sugarcane's 'Edo Ai' jeans.

Initially all cotton processing is done at home, as in Europe. Making yarns/fabric is a cottage industry done by farmers to supplement their income. By the 18th Century, cotton was a huge trade, much centred around Osaka, encompassing agriculture, fish fertilisers, spinning, weaving, dyeing, cloth trading, right up to oil production from cotton seed. Again, this is occurring worldwide as cotton is a major global commodity (white gold).

Cotton's value is such that rags are traded up and down the country and clothes and bedding are patched like New England patchwork quilts.

Dyeing - Japan, like many countries, has a long relationship with Indigo with Dyer's Knotweed - Tade Ai being introduced from China around the 4th Century AD. Tade Ai is still cultivated and cherished as part of the Japanese heritage in the Tokushima district, as has been discussed before on Superfuture.

http://www.superfuture.com/supertalk/showthread.php?t=11213

And before Tade Ai, they had woad (Tasei).

http://www.superfuture.com/supertalk/showthread.php?p=264210#post264210

1850 Isaac Merritt (Rei)Singer perfected the sewing machine, much like the Englishman, Richard Arkwright (who perfected the spinning frame), he nicked all the best bits and put them together, and had the entrepreneurial chops to make a fortune.

1853 Commodore Matthew Perry anchors four black steamships in Edo Bay (Tokyo), which some locals fear as smoke bellowing dragons and almost five months later Japan opens it's doors to trade with USA.

1888 Kurabo established - recognised today as a denim powerhouse. Head Office, is in Fukuyama, just down the road from Osaka.

1893 Kaihara established, weaving indigo yarns.

1896 Superinventor, Sakichi Toyoda invents Toyoda Power Loom.

http://www.toyota-industries.com/corporateinfo/history/

1924 Sakichi Toyoda invents the Automatic Loom Type G, with auto-shuttle change. The most advanced loom of it's day, and the reason why the Japanese didn't need to import US shuttle looms. and in 1929 sold the technology to England and used the money to start the Toyota Motor Company. Also in 1929 they start to make spinning frames.

1930's Under Japan's occupation, cotton is imported from southern Korea. As a side note, Korean friend, also swears that the Japanese mud-dyeing tradition also comes from Korea.

In 1946 the first Toyota sewing machine is produced.

Good luck.

[TallyHo]

Even though the repro jeans that the Japanese produce try and replicate the original American jeans as closely as they possibly can, they have taken on a new meaning. Although the product remains the same, the existence of reproductions of jeans in Japanese culture is entirely different in its significance and value in the context of Japanese cultural values and identity. Differentiation, and therefore identity is thus not achieved through the inherent properties of an object of fashion, but rather through differentiation of the views toward the object. And so, within the context of ever-shifting cultural values and views, it is impossible for an object in a global context to maintain a static meaning.

...

Basically, I'm going to say that the Japanese take value in the elements of the repro (and also by association, vintage) that demonstrate the aesthetic of wabi sabi, and that the single-mindedness with which the Japanese denim producers have tried to replicate denim infers new meanings to an old object. While the physical properties of the repro jeans become closer and closer to the original, the meaning that they carry diverges more and more.

bravo! this is the direction i was hoping to nudge you when i was posting incoherent rants about "innovation vs. imitation vs. appropriation." you've articulated the point very well and i think this is a great direction to take your paper - especially given your course title. i hope you research this topic well, and now i'm really looking forward to reading the final draft! (are you feeling any extra pressure now that everyone in this thread is waiting to read (grade) your paper too? )

ringring - holy smokes! what a history lesson!

this thread just gets better and better...

[thatslapz]

bravo! this is the direction i was hoping to nudge you when i was posting incoherent rants about "innovation vs. imitation vs. appropriation." you've articulated the point very well and i think this is a great direction to take your paper - especially given your course title. i hope you research this topic well, and now i'm really looking forward to reading the final draft! (are you feeling any extra pressure now that everyone in this thread is waiting to read (grade) your paper too? )

ringring - holy smokes! what a history lesson!

this thread just gets better and better...

I must agree, this thread is awesome. I'm sorry, but I don't know of any books on identity not. The article I posted earlier is the article my professor cites in her textbook, so I have a feeling it may be one of the few ones out there.

I have found it particulary interesting to look at this cultural happening in terms of the production consumption disconnect. An instructor for my class told us he received a shipment of clothes, but due to poor containment, all of the clothes smelled like fish and seawater. So they had to have everything dry-cleaned before it was put on the floor to sell. I found this to be an excellent example of how apparel takes on a new life when it is made available to the consumer. The product's journey to the consumer is essentially erased once it reaches the retail location. And with increasing globalization, this journey is increasingly complex.

I see a trend now where repro companies are bridging this production consumption disconnect. They make it known to the consumer how the final product is created, and where materials are sourced from. According to Self Edge's website, RJB doesn't allow people to order their Chambray shirt without educating the consumer about the product. I also see how this may relate to commodity fetishism. However, I admit I know next to nothing about Marxist theory concerning this topic, so I will stay away from it until I'm better educated.

Another interesting point that lmao may want to further address is that the repro companies can't call jeans a product of their culture. I haven't thought out how this may influence their products or designs, but I think by appropriating the basic design, some companies may have wanted to differentiate their products to create a uniquely Japanese product. I'm going to throw in a rather obscure example, but there is a company called "OFNA" which produces radio controlled cars. They have a reputation for improving on designs of their competitors and calling it their own. However they are able to call the product their own because the basic design of these cars is relatively similar. Even among the companies that make the models which are copied, the differences lie in extremely subtle details. With the basic five pocket jean, we see the same thing. A company can call it their own by changing a few subtle details, and no one can really say they are copying someone else because there isn't a real drastic deviation available. Anyways, sorry if I went a bit off topic, but I guess this example demonstrates how a company must strive to differentiate their product without straying too far from a design that has been proven to work.

[raWorkshop]

The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction[/i])

Found the full text off of wikipedia - http://www.marxists.org/reference/subject/philosophy/works/ge/benjamin.htm

[PandaDenim]

This is great.

Yknow, if you are ever in Japan all the sales people are more than willing to throw down history.

The dudes I met at Amerikaya and the Samurai store were willing to throw down some knowledge with me and even tried english because my jap skillz be weak.

[lmaozedong]

If I could only go to Japan to do "research" for this paper... Maybe I could take some field samples as well

[lmaozedong]

For those who are interested, here is a preliminary draft of my paper. I know that people may take issue with some of the details about repro denim that I've included in this paper (although its surprisingly hard to find legitimate sources for information on repro jeans, particularly in English), and of course any criticisms are welcome, and feel free to criticize anything from the style to the content Please ignore the numbers, as they're just the footnotes for the sources I used.

The Japanese have often garnered attention for the ways in which they copy American culture, seemingly trying to imitate the Western world in many ways. Onlookers see the Japanese trends of dying their hair blonde and wearing blue contact lenses as part of the Japanese tendency to try to be as American as possible. The ganguro girl look that was popularized in the early 2000s in the Shibuya district exemplifies this trend—Japanese girls would bleach their hair blonde and wear colored contacts, artificially tanning their skin, in what was often described as an attempt to recreate the “California beach girl” look.1 It is no surprise then that the Japanese would also appropriate the quintessential American garment, the blue jean. In fact, the Japanese often try to find and buy pairs of jeans that were actually worn by Americans, as the Japanese play a dominant role in the market for vintage jeans. Japanese denim companies also produce a wide range of jeans that reproduce the details in American jeans.

Eric Kramer in The Emerging Monoculture suspects that the appropriation of the blue jean by the Japanese is demonstrative of the increasing spread of Western culture and that the transformations of modernity have wiped away ancient Japanese traditions, as reflected in the increasing disconnect of the characters in Japanese fiction with the past and present. Kramer argues that Western culture has become increasingly prevalent in Japan at the expense of Japanese traditions: “Culture, [having been] reduced to the antique... has come to be replaced in everyday life by the new imported culture of the West like Disney, blue jeans, and James Dean”.2 And given that denim in Japan draws its roots from World War II, when GIs populated Japan with their bomber jackets and dungarees during a time when Japan had both a vacuum in its politics and national identity3, it would be easy to pass off the Japanese fondness for Western items like the blue jean as a kind of culture-worship, in which the Japanese seek to replace their traditional cultural values with those of the West. However, while it is true that the Japanese have increasingly taken cultural objects from Western culture, particularly American culture, within these objects that the Japanese have appropriated, traditional Japanese ideals still live on. This truth is particularly evident upon further investigation of the popularization of reproductions of the American blue jean in Japan. And although the blue jean, an American icon, has been transported to Japan in largely its exact original physical form, the meaning it takes on when the blue jean is in its new cultural context for the wearer and the message it transmits is entirely different.

Indeed, the blue jean is possibly the quintessential American garment icon, having its roots in the Gold Rush. James Sullivan, in his book Jeans, describes the blue jean as “America's Gift in the Global Era.”1 After Levi Strauss and Jacob Davis added rivets to the canvas pant, the jean was forever embedded into the history of fashion as both a functional and fashionable piece of clothing.2 The blue jean in its early history was mostly a functional piece, worn mostly by cowboys and ranchers until the 1930s, when it spread to the East Coast during the Great Depression, when ranch owners opened their ranches up for tourism. Vacationers brought the ranch's blue jeans back with them, but it was not until after World War II that the popularity of the blue jean really took off.3

When Hollywood idols in post-World War II such as James Dean (Rebel Without a Cause, 1955) and Marlon Brando (The Wild One, 1953) wore blue jeans in their films, the blue jean already had begun to take on a rough image. As early as 1949, Levi Strauss & Co. had a keen awareness that their product had begun to communicate an unwholesome image, and tried to counter this image with an advertising campaign with the tagline “Denim: Right for School”. At that time, Levi's was fighting the image that “jeans...were shorthand for an outlier, a rogue, a criminal.”1 The exposure jeans received in Hollywood films not only popularized the blue jean, but contributed to the rough image that the jean had taken on. Marlon Brando “understood the feral message that jeans were capable of having,” and would combine his jeans with a ripped dress shirt.2 To contribute to this rough look, young men would intentionally cause wear on their jeans by using sandpaper and wearing their jeans without taking them off for long periods of time, sometimes even months.3 And so, jeans came to communicate a certain young, rebellious image, symbolic of the Beat generation, and were even banned from many high schools.4 Although the denim companies viewed this image as a problem, it is precisely the blue jean's ability in the 1950s to communicate a rough, delinquent image that gave it its increasing popularity.5

It is during the 1950's that the blue jean gained popularity worldwide as well. Before World War II, blue jeans were practically unknown in Europe, but as the American presence in Europe grew near the end of the war and after it, Europeans became more exposed to the blue jean.6 Similarly, the history of the blue jean in Japan also began after the end of World War II, when Japanese began buying and wearing the blue jeans left behind by American GIs.7 By 1957, K.K. Tsunemi was importing jeans for the first time in Japan’s history. Often, the jeans that Tsunemi imported were used and torn up8—the Japanese were accustomed to the softer quality of used denim from the jeans left behind by American soldiers. Vintage, used jeans continued to be popular through the 1980s in Japan. Japan eventually grew to become one of the world's largest consumers of vintage denim, drawn in by vintage denim's aged look.9 In fact, vintage jeans became so popular that the demand for vintage denim blue jeans outstripped supplies in the 1980s10, and today vintage denim sells for more than double in Japan what it would in the U.S.11 It was around this time that denim companies, often headed by executives who themselves were

[lmaozedong]

greatly interested in vintage jeans, began producing reproductions of these jeans, replicating the cut and details of the jeans.

Japanese denim companies have gone to extraordinary lengths to copy the exact details in the jeans they reproduced. The cuts that they use often are direct copies of those jeans produced by major companies like Levi's and Lee during the period when denim was first popularized in American in the mid-20th century. Sugar Cane and Co., one of Japan's premier producers of so-called repro jeans, sells jeans modeled after the Levi's 501, Levi's iconic jeans that have gradually changed over time. Two of Sugar Cane and Co.'s most popular styles are jeans modeled directly after the 501 cut in 1947 and 501 cut in 1966.1 While these Japanese denim companies could have easily stopped at simply reproducing the cuts of American denim, they pay great attention to the details of the jeans, and even the process of making the jeans as well. These companies try to recreate as closely as possible the exact weave of the denim used in the jeans they are copying, even to the extent of using methods that would seemingly be detrimental to their productivity and to the quality of their product in order to closer replicate the original American jean. They use the same type of looms that U.S. manufacturers used until the 1950s, called shuttle looms, often importing and restoring old used looms from the mills where the jeans they are reproducing were made originally.2 These looms produce denim at much slower speeds, operating at speeds as less than one tenth the speed of modern looms3 and using double the material that a modern loom would use. They produce denim that is naturally irregular in their weave, with a rougher, less uniform texture.

Buyers of these reproductions of jeans for the most part also want their jeans to come in a raw state, like they originally had, meaning that they come stiff and are not prewashed, so buyers have to shrink their jeans down to their final size, a practice that was common in denim producers like Levi's and Lee4 until the advent of prewashing, which became popularized around the 1960s (Interestingly, prewashing was first popular in Japan, where the Japanese customer was used to the soft quality of used jeans).5 These raw jeans also show the same aging properties that the American teenagers in the 1960s so loved, fading in places that are exposed to wear and tear, where the indigo rubs off and the fabric becomes frayed. Japanese denim companies also pay thousands of dollars for vintage sewing machines that produce the same “chain stitches” that were on the original jeans they attempt to reproduce.6 Japanese companies have gone to such great lengths to reproduce the details of Japanese jeans that Levi-Strauss & Co. has even filed multiple lawsuits against Japanese brands for too closely copying their jeans. In one example, Hidehiko Yamane, a tailor who was extremely interested in vintage jeans and wanted to recreate the perfect pair of vintage jeans, started a brand named “Evis” in homage to the original Levi's of the mid 20th century, which in his opinion were the pinnacle of jean creation. Not surprisingly, Levi-Strauss & Co. pressured Yamane to change the name of his brand—which he did, rechristening his brand “Evisu”.7 Japanese denim brands and retailers have also been sued for copying the arcuates (the stitched designs on the back pockets of jeans), leather patches, and information cards stapled to the pockets of unsold jeans of Levi's too closely, as well as for copying the signature red “tab” on the pockets of Levi's jeans.8

While the Japanese denim afficionados indeed wear jeans with the same physical properties as those the Americans wore in the 1950s, and seek to copy these American jean as closely as they can, the aspects that the Japanese value in these reproduced jeans are entirely different. The irregularities in the weave of denim were looked down upon in the 1950s and '60s as problems that needed to be fixed.9 However, in the eye of the Japanese consumer today, this irregularity is valued, seen as a more natural. Even the aging process of the jeans, which American teenagers of the 1960s worked so hard on to create a grungy, rough look, takes on new meaning in Japan. Instead of the aged, ripped look symbolizing a rough, rebellious image, the aging process of the blue jean is to the Japanese eye serenely beautiful. Sugar Cane and Co., in marketing their jeans, emphasizes the natural, vintage fades in their denim caused by the uneven texture of their shuttle-loomed fabric.10

The aesthetic idea of beauty being found in the process of natural aging and progression is one that takes its roots in ancient Japanese history. One of the central characterizations of the way that Zen Buddhism, which has existed in Japan since before the 12th century11, views the world, is that “Life is evanescent and fleeting, but overcoming the fear of death is vital for the fulfillment of life.”12 The aesthetic expression of this idea is embodied in the views of wabi-sabi, which value the beauty of the imperfect, impermanent, and incomplete. The wabi-sabi aesthetic asserts that the universe is in a constant state of flux, and that imperfection, impermanence, and asymmetry are not only unavoidable, but indeed beautiful. Thus, art that employs the aesthetic of wabi sabi are often aged, and rely largely on natural, imperfect in their forms.13 This principle is demonstrated in the case of the raku pottery. In contrast to the ornate ceramics from China, raku pottery lacks exact symmetries and uniformity. Instead, potters seek to achieve a “more than perfect” imperfection through a process of low firing. Opposing an artificial pursuit of beauty, the firing process of raku pottery relies on a glazing process in which the ash in the kiln glazes the clay in a natural and almost random process. This process occurs over a gradual process spanning days, and even the potter is unsure of what the result will be until he opens the kiln, appealing to the Zen Buddhist ideal in its harmony of the potter with nature and his acceptance of natural, unavoidable processes.14

[lmaozedong]

The repro jean is, in essence, the expression of the total wabi-sabi aesthetic condensed into a single fashion item. In fact, “a beautifully weathered pair of blue jeans” has been called “the epitome of wabi-sabi” by a denim executive.1 Thus, one can see that within the blue jean, the ancient Japanese tradition of wabi-sabi lives on. In his overview of the wabi-sabi aesthetic, Andrew Juniper attempts to define the design principles in the aesthetic. While this approach is too heavy-handed in its attempt to define and determine the criterion of an aesthetic that is supposed to flow out of a natural conception of beauty, his examples are illustrative of how elegantly the repro jean appeals to and is meaningful in the context of the wabi-sabi aesthetic. Most importantly, any object demonstrating the wabi-sabi aesthetic must be organic in its form: “The tides of time should be able to imprint the passing of the years on an object. The physical decay or natural wear and tear of the materials used does not in the least detract from the visual appeal, rather it adds to it.”2 Naturally, the wear aging properties of the repro jean demonstrate this principle, with its indigo slowly fading off, expressing the wear and tear that comes with the passage of time and contributing to the repro jean's beauty to the viewer in the Japanese context. The second principle in the wabi-sabi aesthetic expressing is freedom of form, allowing nature to dictate forms as is most natural: “Nature has already provided the shape.. it is important that the artist should be devoid of thought and in tune with the natural rhythms of life.”3 Raw, repro jeans usually are sold in a stiff, unnatural shape. However, as raw denim is broken in by the wearer, one of its distinguishing properties is its ability to mold in its shape to its wearers body, evolving naturally to fit his or her form. Objects in wabi-sabi should have texture that is “rough and uneven.. as nothing in the world we perceive is perfect, the idea of perfection is an unattainable concept that can only be approximated.”4 The purposefully looser, more rough and uneven weave of the repro jeans, produced by using shuttle looms, demonstrates this disregard for the conventional, modern views of beauty. The final principle that must be demonstrated in the wabi-sabi aesthetic is the principle of sobriety. Sobriety, in the context of wabi-sabi, is the idea that designs should be kept to a “functional minimum,” demonstrating modesty in design. The Japanese repro jean, lacking the loud back pocket stitching and pre-distressed holes and rips of its more flashy contemporaries, has a beauty that is simple, yet wonderfully natural.

For those companies that produce repro jeans, their lines consist largely of jeans that are exact (or as close to exact as they can achieve) copies of the original American jeans. However, when they do choose to differentiate their jeans, the ways in which they choose to differentiate them are indicative that they are, indeed, aware of and guided by the wabi-sabi aesthetic. These Japanese denim brands have taken great care in developing dyeing techniques that emphasize the natural, beautiful fades even more than those in the original vintage denim that Japanese denim afficionados so appreciated. For example, Flat Head Company, a Japanese denim brand that produces jeans in reproduction-style vintage cuts as well as a selection of more modern, fitted jeans, is particularly well known for its jeans' emphatic fades that naturally occur over the jeans' lifetimes.5 Often, repro jeans are dyed using traditional Japanese dyeing techniques, and natural indigo is often used in place of the far more prevalent synthetic indigo in the interest of creating a more natural look.6 These denim companies also try and create a more 'slubby,' uneven texture in the denim through modifying their looms to create an even greater natural imperfect beauty in their denim, leading to more natural, uneven fades.7 These fades are unpredictable, and the wearer does not know how they will turn out until they have actually worn in the jeans, in a process that parallels the firing of the raku pottery. Although the changes that denim companies sometimes bring to their products that differentiate them from the original, these differences are minor and, for the most part, repro denim brands seek to replicate the original Levi's or other jeans in as much detail as they can, introducing new meanings in these previously insignificant details that did not exist before.

And so, one can see that the Japanese have, for the most part appropriated the blue jean in its original form for their own use, and that the Japanese have obviously been open to the blue jean and the other changes that the West have brought—at one point, a narrow margin in a vote was all that kept Japan from changing its official language to English.8 However, the ancient Japanese values remain entrenched today, whether it be consciously or subconsciously, as seen in the way they approach the repro jean and their aesthetic sensibilities. While to the American teenager of the '50s and '60s, the blue jean communicated a rebellious image, representing a desire to rebel and resist their surroundings, to the Japanese wearers of the blue jean, it communicates something completely different—a sober beauty, guided an aesthetic with entirely different values from the American youth. The wabi-sabi aesthetic stems from the Zen principle of taking the path of least resistance and accepting nature as is, a stark contrast to the recalcitrant views of mid-20th century American jean-wearers.9 And while the blue jean of the '50s and '60 was the uniform of the disillusioned working class, and came to symbolize delinquency, in Japan, the reproductions of these jeans, generally priced upwards of $150 U.S. dollars per pair of jeans, have come to represent a luxury.10

Much in the way that Calvin Klein and Tommy Hilfiger jeans received an entirely different meaning when they were transmitted into the world of hip-hop culture11, the blue jean, upon arriving in Japan, took on an entirely different meaning. It is not that the object itself has changed in its physical properties—indeed, the aim of the Japanese repro denim companies are to reproduce the original jeans worn in America in the 1950s as closely as possible—but rather, that the context in which the Japanese view their jeans and the messages they transmit within that context are entirely different. After all, as Umberto Eco stats, “communication encompasses the whole of culture.”12 Thus one see that given differences in cultural contexts, the same fashion item, jeans, can have entirely different communicative abilities based on their relationships to the objects that surround them in that culture. While in Japanese culture, the blue jean has absorbed significance in its relationship with the wabi-sabi aesthetic through its association with objects that are based on the same aesthetic, the blue jean in the context of American culture has absorbed an entirely different set of significances based on its historical associations.

While the physical properties down to the most minute detail of the blue jean have remained exactly the same in its transmission from '50s and '60s America to Japan, the meaning it has taken on for its wearers and in the message that it communicates has become entirely different. And while the physical properties of the repro jean have been coming closer and closer to the originals they are reproducing, through the value that the Japanese take in the wabi-sabi aesthetic of the repro jeans and the single-mindedness with which they have pursued perfection to the detail in their reproductions, the meanings of the blue jean have in fact diverged more and more. Differentiation, then, and therefore identity is not achieved through any inherent properties in an object of fashion, but rather through the differentiation of how that object is viewed. As the way a fashion object is viewed is a product of cultural contexts and histories, within the context of ever-shifting cultural values and views, and within the context of the ever-building history of that object, it is impossible, in a global context, for an object to maintain a static meaning. Upon transmission into another culture, or, perhaps even within a culture itself, the meaning which a piece of clothing communicates will never cease to continue changing.

[Guest Ark Sakura]

Excellent essay, LMao. It's a sort of syncretism you are describing, where a wabi sabi aesthetic meets the reproduction of an iconic American product.

However I'm not entirely convinced by your reading of the symbolic meaning that wearing blue jeans has in the two different cultures. I guess the generalizations made me bristle slightly. But still it's a great paper.

This is a cool thread. I just discovered it. I'll have to come back and read through it...when it isn't 2:15 am.

[lmaozedong]

Honestly, I know what you mean--I think I have some wording issues where I'm a little bit too general in the statements I make. I'll fix that later but I kind of have the feeling the HJJ will explode upon reading this essay. Anyway, generalizing too much was my biggest concern when I started writing this paper, and I talked to my teacher a couple times about it--he seemed to be pretty unconcerned about any over-generalizations I might make. It seems like he believes them to be more or less inevitable in an essay like this..

[rnrswitch]

HJJ explodes when he reads a lot of stuff. Just kidding... kind of.

[lmaozedong]

Hey guys, I'm turning in this essay later this week so any comments you have would be greatly appreciated! I know it's a lot of reading..

[blm14]

is it me, or does this link:

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/4/40/2003ass.PNG

Imply that China is full of asses?!

[TallyHo]

paper looks good! reminded me how i always felt i learned the most in college when i was doing independent research for papers (not so much from lectures or required readings). i'd bet you learned a lot of interesting tidbits through this process. i'm jealous.

i agree that there are definitely some generalizations, and even a few intentional oversights to benefit your thesis, but all in all well done!

if you want an honest "grading perspective" review, here are a few points:

1. though your ideas are well researched and presented, you might want to reconsider the structure of the paper. moving a few paragraphs around could help the flow a lot. particularly at the beginning - you may want to mention wabi sabi at the beginning (not necessarily describe its meaning there, but at least mention it in the first or second paragraph?) to help clarify where the rest of your paper is leading. to the same end, i'm not certain the "ganguro girl" bit works well in an introductory paragraph.

2. many of your sentences could be far more clear and concise. syntax is a bit scattered from start to finish. since it's a rough draft, maybe you've already handled this... bottom line - less commas, more periods. sorry i don't have time to give specific examples...

is it me, or does this link:

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/4/40/2003ass.PNG

Imply that China is full of asses?!

haha, good point.

[lmaozedong]

Thanks TallyHo!

As far as introducing wabi sabi earlier goes, it would be pretty easy to insert that into the second paragraph I think somewhere. And yeah, I'm not entirely sure the whole ganguro thing fits in anywhere in my paper. I just wanted to introduce the paper with some popularized way in which the Japanese have "stolen" American culture. As far as paragraph organization goes, are those the only two comments I have? I kind of rushed this at the end so I don't really know how I feel about the paper generally. And I definitely agree with you on the syntax etc. the writing is pretty horrid even by my standards but hopefully I'll get a chance to fix all that after my final tomorrow..

[raWorkshop]

Emm, not feeling too intellectual during finals week myself but yeah, I echo comments made and just a nit pick, you forgot the "e" in "states" near your Eco quote.

Good job though. Everyone in this thread should come together and make a documentary + coffee table book.

[PandaDenim]

What grade did you get?

A+.

[ringring]

How did the paper go?

Too late, but there's an interesting story that's told by Kaihara (who, incidentally, introduced Japan's first rope dyeing machine in the 70's) that reflects their approach to denim making.

"There is a traditional wisdom from 'Shiki' (an ancient Chinese book), saying that 'Although peaches and plums do not speak anything, a path is formed naturally'. It means that even though peaches and plums say nothing, people are still attracted by their blossoms and luscious fruits. They visit the peach and plum trees from time to time, thus a path is formed"

[duck sauce]

"If beginning today all further Aryan influence on Japan should stop, assuming that Europe and America should perish, Japan's present rise in science and technology might continue for a short time; but even in a few years the well would dry up, the Japanese special character would gain, but the present culture would freeze and sink back into the slumber from which it was awakened seven decades ago by the wave of Aryan culture. Therefore, just as the present Japanese development owes its life to Aryan origin, long ago in the gray past foreign influence and foreign spirit awakened the Japanese culture of that time. The best proof of this is furnished by the fact of its subsequent sclerosis and total petrifaction. This can occur in a people only when the original creative racial nucleus has been lost, or if the external influence which furnished the impetus and the material for the first development in the cultural field was later lacking. But if it iS established that a people receives the most essential basic materials of its culture from foreign races, that it assimilates and adapts them, and that then, if further external influence is lacking, it rigidifies again and again, such a race may be designated as culture-bearing,' but never as 'culture-creating.' An examination of the various peoples from this standpoint points to the fact that practically none of them were originally culture-founding, but almost always culture-bearing."

guess what this passage is from.

[rnrswitch]

I may be missing the point, excuse me, but I don't quite get the point of posting that without adding some sort of explanation. Maybe an examination of why it pertains to this thread or maybe how it is a gross oversimplification.

[raWorkshop]

"If beginning today all further Aryan influence on Japan should stop, assuming that Europe and America should perish, Japan's present rise in science and technology might continue for a short time; but even in a few years the well would dry up, the Japanese special character would gain, but the present culture would freeze and sink back into the slumber from which it was awakened seven decades ago by the wave of Aryan culture. Therefore, just as the present Japanese development owes its life to Aryan origin, long ago in the gray past foreign influence and foreign spirit awakened the Japanese culture of that time. The best proof of this is furnished by the fact of its subsequent sclerosis and total petrifaction. This can occur in a people only when the original creative racial nucleus has been lost, or if the external influence which furnished the impetus and the material for the first development in the cultural field was later lacking. But if it iS established that a people receives the most essential basic materials of its culture from foreign races, that it assimilates and adapts them, and that then, if further external influence is lacking, it rigidifies again and again, such a race may be designated as culture-bearing,' but never as 'culture-creating.' An examination of the various peoples from this standpoint points to the fact that practically none of them were originally culture-founding, but almost always culture-bearing."

guess what this passage is from.

Mein Kampf?

[lmaozedong]

Hey guys thanks for all your support in writing this paper. I feel I owe my paper almost completely to all of you--just to let you know, I got an A on my paper.

Anyway, I really do think this is a very interesting topic so I hope that discussion continues even though I'm done writing this paper

[PandaDenim]

Could you send me a copy of it?

[TallyHo]

I may be missing the point, excuse me, but I don't quite get the point of posting that without adding some sort of explanation. Maybe an examination of why it pertains to this thread or maybe how it is a gross oversimplification.

my sentiments exactly... which is why i ignored that post when it was made. would "neg" but what's the point really? bringin ignorance to an otherwise awesome thread. the ol' Reductio ad Hitlerum.

congrats on the A dude! well done!

and i would also like to see the final draft if it changed much from the last version you posted up...