KUU KUU HARAJUKU: ON GROWING UP WITH GWEN STEFANI, JAPAN STREET FASHION + CULTURAL APPROPRIATION
http://1025kiss.com/kuu-kuu-harajuku-on-growing-up-with-gwen-stefani-japan-street-fashion-cultural-appropriation/
“Like an echo pedal, she repeats herself: Stefani’s executive-producing a new animated show, Kuu Kuu Harajuku, for Nickelodeon. Much like her fashion line and fragrances, it selectively borrows from authentic Harajuku fashion and Tokyo street culture. Unsurprisingly, the show also doesn’t seem to have any official Japanese showrunners at its helm either, and all but one player — Filipino-Australian actress Charlotte Nicdao — on its primary voice cast is white.
Similar to the plot and stylings of Cartoon Network’s also American-made Hi Hi Puffy AmiYumi Show (which was, at least, based off the actual J-pop band and included them in some form), the series follows a band called HJ5—led by G, a blonde stand-in for Gwen Stefani of course, who positions herself as a leader of all things deemed “Harajuku.”
“Stefani [has always had a] love of pop art and lifelong admiration for the street fashion and creative youth culture found in the renowned Harajuku neighborhood of Tokyo, Japan,” a press release for the show states, according to Us Weekly. “It was while writing her first solo album that Stefani created the original Harajuku Girl characters as a celebration of the creativity and individualism she saw and loved in the Harajuku District.””
Looking Back at Love. Angel. Music. Baby., Gwen Stefani's Racist Pop Frankenstein, Ten Years Later:The album is simultaneously a racist mess, a lyrical car crash, and a treasure chest containing champagne kisses.
https://www.vice.com/en_us/article/nnqmam/revisiting-gwen-stefanis-racist-pop-frankenstein-ten-years-later-567
Margaret Cho's response to the "Gwen Stefani's Harajuku Girls"
10.31.2005
“I want to like them, and I want to think they are great, but I am not sure if I can. I mean, racial stereotypes are really cute sometimes, and I don’t want to bum everyone out by pointing out the minstrel show. I think it is totally acceptable to enjoy the Harajuku girls, because there are not that many other Asian people out there in the media really, so we have to take whatever we can get. Amos ‘n Andy had lots of fans, didn’t they? At least it is a measure of visibility, which is much better than invisibility. I am so sick of not existing, that I would settle for following any white person around with an umbrella just so I could say I was there.
It is weird being Asian American right now, because I don’t exactly know what my place is. America is supposed to be for everyone, and people are supposed to treat me like I belong here, and yet you would never know that from watching tv or movies. I still get the questions about where I am really from. Then when I try to explain this feeling of invisibility to those whose every move and moment is entirely visible, they come back at me with, “Maybe Asian Americans don’t want to be in entertainment!” Yes he really said that. I just screamed, because there was no other way I could answer without hitting him.
Even though to me, a Japanese schoolgirl uniform is kind of like blackface, I am just in acceptance over it, because something is better than nothing. An ugly picture is better than a blank space, and it means that one day, we will have another display at the Museum of Asian Invisibility, that groups of children will crowd around in disbelief, because once upon a time, we weren’t there.”
Some..questionable comparisons however she made an effort to speak on this issue concerning the Harajuku Girls in a time when not many other dared and before “cultural appropriation” was a house hold term and with that in mind the context of what she said and how she said it makes more sense to me.
I related much more to both of these articles and their shared experiences than I would honestly care to admit, but the truth of the matter is that this was one of my first exposures I had as a kid seeing girls who looked like me in the national spotlight of music in mainstream pop culture. It felt like a confused type of validation that at the time I had no way of comprehending. Unfortunately the experience of grow up only to realize that the characters we idolized and adored in our childhood are actually racist stereotypes.. is nothing new. The real challenge follows this internal awakening, with two choice. Option 1 is to take the blue pill and to retire our decade old relationship with these characters and reflect on how these popular images shaped our identity and perspectives of the self or try our best to remember them fondly while still analyzing and critiquing. Or option 2 you can take the red pill and stay in a state of blissful ignorance and happily enjoy these oppressive representations without the feeling of consequence.