‘Fashion and Race’ Reading Group co-convened by APC scholar Erica de Greef
Erica de Greef reports back on the reading group she co-convened to discuss racial and cultural bias in the fashion industry, particularly in relation to fashion education.
With fellow PhD fashion scholar Tanveer Ahmed from the Open University, I co-convened a reading group, in collaboration with the Fashion Research Network, a London-based network that supports and shares the work of early career researchers in fashion and dress studies. The event took place on 14 October 2015 and was hosted by INIVA’s Stuart Hall Special Collections Library in London. Our aim was to invite discussion in relation to our experience of biased racial and cultural practices, particularly in fashion education but cognisant that these occur throughout the fashion system.
Nick Brown from INIVA introduced the library holdings and shared a brief history of the work of INIVA as a site for cultural diversity, debate and expression. The two-hour session saw ten participants share discussions contextualised via a selection of academic texts, including Ruby Sircar and Dorinne Kondo, as well as reflecting on recent media responses to the fashion collections of Junya Watanabe, Kanye West, Pyer Moss and Valentino; H&M’s latest fashion campaign Close The Loop; and also considering ongoing reports on the lack of diversity and transformation in the industry.
The key points of the evening reflected on the ways in which notions of race are perpetuated, appropriated, misunderstood, marginalised, and mostly silenced, in an industry that is paradoxically presented as global, diverse, expressive and inclusive.
Dr Sarah Cheong (Royal College of Art) succinctly captured the essence of Eurocentric ‘whiteness’ in fashion, in its refusal to racialise itself while continuing to exoticise ‘others’ in exhibitions, media, runway collections, and the concepts and terms used to define the ‘global’ hegemony that is fashion. The other participants of the evening were Elli Michaela Young (Design History Society), Carole Myers (London Metropolitan University), Katerina Pantelides and Nathanial Dafydd Beard (Fashion Research Network), Natascha and Babette Radclyffe-Thomas (London College of Fashion), and Lucy Gundry (Royal College of Art).