Harajuku Fashion: Gyaru Fashion Defies Japanese Beauty Standards But Does it Also Offend Cultural Heritage?
Can you remember what was popular in the early 2000s? If you’re any older or younger than a millennial, it might just be a blur to you. Maybe you can remember the pop culture of the time, Paris Hilton, reality TV, Beyonce, MySpace, etc.
With this new era, a new style emerged. Here in the states, this consisted of animal print, crimped hair, velvet jumpsuits, all sorts of glamor.
In Tokyo, the early 2000s style change was a bit different.
This started with fashion in a district of Tokyo, known as Harajuku. There, quite a few new styles were born. There was ko-gyaru, cosplay, lolita, visual kei, decora, and many others. All were unique and all were very popular in early 2000s Japanese culture.
There was one style in particular that caught some controversy however, this style is known as gyaru.
Gyaru fashionistas, also called Gals, which gained popularity in the 1990s.
They took influence from fashion icons in Japan at the time, such as Tsubasa Masuwaka and Kumiko Funayama (Kumicky)
There are many different substyles of gyaru streetwear.
Although most of the time, when you see a gal you’ll come across a few basics, minskirts, long nails, high hair, and bold makeup (usually white lined eyes and long lashes)
Gals intend to bring other cultures into their style as well as defy the existing beauty standards in Japan.
Japan had the idea of femininity being polite, pale faced, paired with natural, minimalistic styles
Gals not only defy Japan’s standards of women through clothing but often will portray themselves as rude and vulgar.
With this background in mind, there has been a lot of controversy surrounding gyaru gals and their use of fake tans and pulling from other cultures.
There are actually a few different sustyles of gyaru fashion that describe skin tone, shirogyaru (pale skin), kurogyaru (brown skin), and ganguro (really black/dark skin).
Kurogyaru is usually acclaimed by gyaru gals using fake tan or having natural melanin. Ganguro can be acclaimed for having natural melanin, which is more accepted, otherwise it’s pale girls putting on incredibly dark foundations or tanning or even using shoe cleaners to darken their skin tones.
This rides on the line of blackfishing. As not only is the tan and the lengths to tan their skin extreme, it is sometimes seen as a joke among Japanese residents to tan very dark. Overall this style is seen as insensitive to gals who are black and participating in gyaru styles. Since, if someone is already pale, they can participate in the same styles without painting their faces essentially black. Social media influencer, @maliciouscitrus on instagram, youtube, and tiktok is a young ganguro gal that is darkskin and speaks on this controversy saying
“Ganguro was a style that was filled with people who were not nearly anywhere close to the skin tones that they were painting themselves or tanning themselves to be. That’s weird” she says.
“I still see it as insensitive because like there’s tons of black people who already have that skin tone already and you can naturally be ganguro. Like there is always a three shade rule no matter like what shade or what race you are” she stated in a Tiktok of her’s in 2022.
There is well under 1% of people of african descent living in Japan which could be the reason as to why they’re is/was such little awareness. I think this cultural awareness is becoming more apparent now that there are social media platforms for these kinds of discussions.
Another gyaru social influencer, Haruka, speaks to this fact as well, being a mixed person.
Her opinion is as follows “As a blasian person, I would say that this counts as blackfishing, cause ganguro goes to the extent of literally painting your face black…it’s pretty much like black face and blackfishing. There are many gyarus these days reclaiming the word ganguro, a lot of the people reclaiming, wear the makeup similar to yamanba…I personally do not like the style ganguro unless it is reclaimed by people who are brown or black. Especially in Japan people do this as a joke or to be a funny thing” she says. Haruka is found at the handle @otkoharuka, if you want to see more of their opinions and sense of style.
Even though the heart of gyaru is to defy beauty standards, including those of pale skin, the extent of the style ganguro can be taken in ways that are offensive to other cultures.
Furthermore, a lot of gyaru fashion took inspiration from black cultures.
Janet Jackson was very popular at the rise of gyaru fashion and this influenced other musicians, particularly in Japan in the way they danced and styled themselves. These Japanese influencers were the pinnacles for gyaru fashion and thus passed down the appreciation to other Japanese youth. Much of the gyaru fashion scene since incorporated a lot of R&B music and hip hop influences, a dominantly black subculture. Black women were seen as beautiful in this aspect.
However, when did it cross the line?
A substyle of gyaru called B-kei, seemed to have done it. This style includes many Japanese women with box braids.
Box braids are sacred and significant to those of african descent because of the history behind them but also because the hairstyle is specifically for their hair type.
Which is why Japanese girls wearing this hairstyle can also be seen as offensive. This gyaru style is pictured in magazines such as Egg Magazine, a big one for gals inspo.
I believe this aligns with the same reasoning as ganguro, that being, there was little awareness around what is offensive to other cultures in Japan.
However, it still aligns with the boundaries of cultural appropriation, and certainly through following along the opinions of many gals who are black, it is apparent that they consider it insensitive, so I agree with them, the hairstyle is something that was taken directly from black culture so I understand the hate it gets.
Moving forward past styles of gyaru fashion, Harajuku streetwear is not ALL controversial. There are many different aspects to each style in Harajuku, and it’s usually based on that subculture’s interests and/or values. Many of them value individualism, something that takes them away from the crowd and says something about themselves.
This is why I fell in love with Harajuku streetwear, it was different, it was making headway in diversifying the population and it’s expressive, it’s fun.
Personally, I want to wake up everyday and have people notice something about me, rather than just being another face in the crowd. I like to have fun with the style and allow it to convey my beliefs.
Harajuku style also is great to look at for fashion inspo for designers. I’ve always had a fascination with making my own clothes, and buying clothes with a purpose, that aren’t from another overpriced sweatshop. Harajuku fashion allowed me to explore all these ideas and parts of myself I wouldn’t have before.
Don’t be turned away from the style even though today’s article isn’t a fun read, of course, everything has hate and love, we just need to create boundaries to avoid being offensive and that allows people to actually send the message they intended.