Cultural Appropriation vs. Celebrating Diversity: A How To Guide
Cultural appropriation is the act of adopting elements of an outside, often underrepresented culture, including knowledge, practices, and symbols, without understanding or respecting the original culture and context. Oftentimes, these elements of culture are things that are looked down upon or criticized by mainstream society when embraced by minority groups, but celebrated when dominant groups adapt them. For example, dreadlocks. Black communities embrace this hairstyle but will be considered “dirty” or “inappropriate” by judgemental and/or white folks. But when “boxer braids” or dreadlocks are worn by white people, many of the same people consider it fashionable and “urban”. The issue of black people being persecuted for their natural hair is such a massive problem that the Crown Act had to be created in order for black folks to be able to wear their hair as they choose. Cultural appreciation is when elements of a culture are used while honoring the source they came from. It is important to note that appreciation involves respect and value. Following our first example, instead of saying “boxer braids”, you call them cornrows or locs, while also advocating for the right of anyone to wear them. You acknowledge that black communities invented the style and should be allowed to rock them with the same amount of praise as a white person, if not more.
In today’s mainstream fashion world, we frequently witness aspects of Native American culture, Black culture, Asian culture, and more being appropriated by the white designers and executives, without giving credit or respecting the sacredness of some of the styles. Most recently, there was a fashion show that had the models sporting feathers in their hair, sacred symbols on the clothes, along with other elements of Native American culture. When confronted, the designer claimed that they were inspired by the Soux and Iroquois tribes, and it was almost like a homage to their experiences. But this inspiration was not noted publicly until their appropriation was called out, and the lack of respect for feathers and symbols make us wonder if the intentions were truly one of appreciation instead of appropriation.
I could go on and on with examples of appropriation, but that won’t help solve the problem. Instead, let’s go over four ways you can be an ally to cultures different from your own.
To start, research other cultures.
I know, asking you to do homework is not what you wanted to hear. But it’s the most effective way to be an ally. Talk to your friends, family, coworkers; go online and learn about sacred symbols or where certain trends came from. Learn all you can so that when you go to get your hair done, or get dressed, or create art, or anything else, you know where these ideas came from, what they mean, and how they are perceived by dominant culture. This will help inform you on what may not be the most ethical clothing company to buy from, what hairstyles are discriminatory for black folks but not white. Ask yourself what message your decisions are sending out. Do you really want to be reinforcing those ideals?
Please, don’t dress up as an ethnicity or other culture for Halloween
Costumes often poke fun at heritage or make light of historic tragedy. Halloween is a time to dress up and have fun, but we still need to be respectful. Dressing up as a black person or a Native American or a terrorist sends the message that their identities aren’t taken seriously, they’re funny, and it shows an ignorance to the sacredness of culturally important clothing. This doesn’t change if you think you are “honoring” a group or individual either. It’s always a bad choice.
Investigate your why
A person’s intention can be different from the resulting impact. For example, you may love the movie Pocahontas and want to dress up like her for Halloween in order to show your respect and admiration for her strength and Native American culture. Your intent here is positive. But the impact you may have on others could be negative. As I stated above, dressing up as another culture is not always respectful. So make sure to investigate why you want to do certain things, and who it may affect.
Avoid Stereotypography
Stereotypography is the practice of stereotyping non-Western cultures via font type. Be immediately suspicious of any typeface that “looks like” a culture or country. For example, so-called “wonton” or “chop-suey” fonts, whose visual style is thought to express “Asianness” or to suggest Chinese calligraphy, have long appeared on food cartons, signs, campaign websites, and even Abercrombie & Fitch T-shirts with racist caricatures of Asians. Creating and naming fonts after stereotypes of a culture not only reinforce the stereotype, but it belittles the culture.
