Description

Today we talk with Nobue about her field specialty, school uniforms and male gaze, or seifuku gaze as she calls it. Seifuku (uniforms) gaze describes the mix between male gaze and objectification of the symbol of the schoolgirl uniform, erasing the human behind the symbol of the clothing.

Check out the coming up exhibition of Nobue:
Designers With A Cause : Creating awareness about social injustices towards women🔥
➡️Upcoming exhibtion: Breaking Down Gender Dynamic Through Clothes
12.03.21

@designerswithacause

Welcome back to Feminist in Tokyo, today we’re going to talk about a topic which is causing quite a division within the opinions I heard so far, and that’s the Japanese school uniforms, more specifically the female ones. Why is the topic controversial? Countries seem to be divided around the globe on the uniform question, and you can probably think right now of the stance of your own country. For example, I’m from France, a country which used to have uniforms, my mother for example had a few in public schools but nowadays it’s definitely scarcer, mostly in private schools. I didn’t grow up wearing school uniforms. Japan, on the other hand, has an enormous school uniform culture. It will only take you a few minutes of walking in the street, city or countryside, to see many different styles of uniforms, for many ages. It can be fashionable, it’s also a big part of the anime and manga sphere, uniforms are something that some teenagers wear even outside of school days either because it’s cute or fun, or they can’t really decide what else to wear. Adults wear it too, something I see frequently when I go to Akihabara for example. When you go take a purikura or go to the karaoke, school uniforms can be rented for fun.

Uniforms can be heavily sexualized, and not only in Japan. Have you ever tried to search for schoolboy vs schoolgirl in a research engine? Schoolboy sure, you get images of normal boys going to school. Schoolgirl? Welcome to the porn universe. How many times did you come across some adults video with a school uniform fantasy? So yes, uniforms, complicated story, let’s talk about it.

Today I’m lucky to have Nobue with me who accepted to talk about this topic she knows very well. Nobue's parents are taiwanese and lived most of their lives in Japan. Btw if you ever have a chance to go to Taiwan, please drop any other plans you have. Nobue’s born in Japan, speaks Japanese, Mandarin and English. Her earlier studies were done in Japan in a prestigious catholic, all-girls, international school in Tokyo. She also studied Fashion Design/Fashion Marketing at Savannah College of Art and Design in the US for 5 years. 

Nobue lived in the US for a while. She’s been diving into the world of fashion for quite some time, after an internship in the fashion brand Mi Jong Lee, also quite a bit of experience in hollywood styling. Nowadays, she’s doing a thesis at the Bunka Gakuen University, and the theme is, Japanese school uniforms.

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