Film and Fashion in Japan, 1923-39

Film and Fashion in Japan, 1923-39 examines the interaction between the audience member and Japan's film and fashion industries, focusing on Western-inspired fashion objects as opposed to indigenous Japanese items. Taking an interdisciplinary approach, Barnett examines the semiotics of dress onscreen within Japan's transcultural media climate, consulting not only film- or fashion-related theoretical bases but also historical and gender-based approaches. The work consults surviving films, print media and advertising materials, allowing insights into lost films and the period's thriving commercial context. It focuses on the expressive Modern Girl image (the Japanese equivalent of the Hollywood flapper); sportswear and hybridised dress styles (which combined Japanese and Western-influenced aesthetics) and their relationship with body; and menswear in the early work of the director Ozu Yasujirō. This book discusses the role of fashion consumption in defining emergent modern identities and their relationships with new spaces, questioning their arising in the Japanese context and within the global sphere. Lois J. E. Barnett is a Postdoctoral Research Associate at the School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London (SOAS).