Blog 2 – Better Lives themes reflection.
Our generation have a great potential to incorporate dramatic changes and shape our future society in better way, which will create better lives. This unit informs and allows us to analyse quite sensitive topics.
All topics are important, but I would like to talk about few of those that, in my opinion, requires immediate change.
Firstly, Sustainability.
Even before starting this unit, sustainability was always one of my concern. I make sure I always recycle. I try to replace as much plastic into alternative recyclable materials as much as I can. I always try to avoid buying water bottles from the shop and making sure I have got my reusable coffee cup and water bottle with me at all times and so on. However, this unit allows me to analyse and think further. Studying fashion, I have to understand that fast-fashion has a great amount of imprint on sustainability today. Regardless of me not knowing how it can be implemented into my future career, I can say for sure, that I will continue explore this topic and think how it can be improved.
Secondly, Representation, Diversity and Inclusion.
Representation was one of my favourite lectures, which I spoke of in my first blog.
Before this unit, I have heard that Fashion industry has a lack of representation, but I did not realise the scale of this issue. Diversity and representation has been improving majorly in the last decade, at least that is what I thought. What actually happened in most cases, is that many designers and big companies adapted the way of Tokenism to satisfy the concern of consumers or because it is simply became popular to be ‘Diverse’. “Tokenism is an industry practice where designers seek to fill diversity quotas by hiring a small number of individuals from under-represented groups to allude to the appearance of equality in fashion.”(Osaghae, 2019) So the question is, how can we overcome tokenism and normalise diversity and representation?
To conclude, I am so happy to be a part of UAL and being able to explore those topics individually through this unit. I am sure, as more I explore and educate myself, as more ideas “How to create Better Lives” will evolve.
Bibliography:
Osaghae, O. (2019) A Lack of Diversity: Exposing The Dark Issue At The Heart of The UK Fashion Industry. Available at:https://www.rebeccadavi.com/single-post/ALackOfDiversityInUKFashionIndustry(Accessed: 25 April, 2020)