Japanese fashion cultures are widely known phenomena nowadays, even if there is still a lot of disinformation circulating in the most different spaces, especially on social media. The initial shock caused by the aggressive aesthetics of some subcultures unveils prejudices, stereotypes and orientalist visions. On the other hand, a contextualization capable of explaining why these ways of dressing or behaving are generally seen with strangeness. This essay aims then to discuss subcultures under fashion theory to understand how fashion in its potential to create identities and subjectivities was taken by the youth to challenge and to resist traditional discourses and expectations. It is argued that subcultures are powerful forms of socialization of individuals that share the same insecu- rities and anxieties, hugely accentuated amid Japan’s economic, political and social instabilities in late 80’s early 90’s. However, subcultures are unlikely to escape the logic of fashion that trans- forms what was subversive into something socially acceptable. This points to the own plasticity and dynamism of the field, as well as to the need to constantly update the categories of comprehension concerning Japanese fashion.
HETT, Rafael. Japanese fashion subcultures as an act of resistance, p. 361-385. In: AVANCINI, Atílio; HASHIMOTO CORDARO, Madalena; OKANO, Michiko (orgs.). Ecos de Catástrofes. São Paulo: GEAA, 2023 (in Portuguese).
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[…] The ideas of natural and artificial are remade every day, the human being gains new abilities, hybridisms emerge and new ethical and moral paradigms enters into debate. This is the Anthropocene, the era of humans, named after the immense intervening power Humanity became. However, the future is not as bright as it seems, with many problems appearing in the same speed of the technological releases. […] More specifically, this work analyzed how this different way of thinking, seeing, feeling and existing in an intertwined world appears in the production of Japanese fashion designer Kunihiko Morinaga, creative director of the brand ANREALAGE, created in Tokyo in 2003, and that has been, since then, showing presentations with concepts seemingly dualists, yet they reveal the possibility of coexistence. […] it was intended to discuss by which ways Morinaga’s cultural transit points some incongruencies and limitations of the West, as well as generates new cultural frames of reference that incorporate techno-animism in order to suggest how we can manage the problems of the Anthropocene.
HETT, Rafael. Techno-animism and the aesthetics of coexistence in the fashion of Japanese brand ANREALAGE. 2022. Universidade de São Paulo, Master’s thesis (in Portuguese).
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[…] Differing from the vision normally attributed by occidentals that the Japanese society rigidity and its conventions are the very responsible for the mental individual’s vulnerability, leading to the point of committing suicide, we see the necessity of amplifying the categories of comprehension concerning a culture extremely founded into ideals yet not well clarified for those who do not belong to it.
SANTOS, R. F. dos, and A. SPAREMBERGER. “The Indissociability Between Literature and Society in ‘Patriotism’ (1961) by Mishima Yukio”. Estudos Japoneses, no. 39, July 2018, pp. 93-107, doi:10.11606/ej.v0i39.159789 (in Portuguese).
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[…] Attention is drawn to the fact that despite being set in Tokyo, a myriad of conceptions, myths and famous characters from the post-Hellenic imaginary is brought to the reader. These signs coexist with Japanese classical and popular elements, such as tanka poetry and typical fugu fish. Therefore, a syncretistic universe is created by the attempt of interpreting new signs, revealing not only the relation of constructing the Other but also the very instability of culture.
In: DOS SANTOS, Rafael Felipe; OURIQUE, João Luis Pereira. “Minotaur vs. Godzilla: Greco-Japanese Syncretism in The Only Happy Ending for a Love Story is an Accident, by João Paulo Cuenca“. Revista Olho d’água, v. 10, p. 79-91, 2018 (in Portuguese).
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[…] It is based on the premise that the difficulty of constraining fashion within the bounds of laws already denoted the enormous power of this domain, responsible for a revolution in Japanese thought and aesthetics easily observed through an unpretentious visual analysis of the evolution of kimonos (and Western attire) in the Meiji, Shōwa, and Taishō periods, subsequent to the Edo period.
In: DOS SANTOS, Rafael Felipe; SPAREMBERGER, Alfeu. “Sumptuary laws in Japan: the role of fashion in maintaining the Tokugawa regime and Edo period society“. In: XXVI Congresso de Iniciação Científica da Universidade Federal de Pelotas, 2017 (in Portuguese).
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[…] This paper attempts to show how fashion constitutes a relevant element to build the diegesis, the characters’ perception about themselves and about others, and, in an intra- and extratextual movement, the view of the post-Revolution French society. Finally, this paper seeks to combine domains not very often linked and to present the opportunity of an enlargement of perspectives on the literary text and its social environment.
In: SANTOS, Rafael Felipe dos; MACHADO, Maristela Gonçalves Sousa. “The interface between fashion and literature in Balzac’s novel le Colonel Chabert“. Lettres Françaises (UNESP Araraquara), v. 18, p. 247-261, 2017 (in Portuguese).
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