Making and Growing Washi Paper Clothes: A Framework for Interspecies Fashion Design in the Anthropocene
Daphne Mohajer va Pesaran, 2018, PhD Dissertation
Abstract:
Can a method for making materials and forms for fashion be developed that is contingent on relationships between local communities of humans and nonhumans—creating material and form between growing and making?Climate scientists have identified the anthropogenic causes of climate change. The concomitant changes resulting from human action will likely usher us from the Holocene, which began roughly 11,000 years ago, into the Anthropocene. The ecological crises of the Anthropocene force fashion to reconsider its relationships with nature. Through an examination of community-based practices in Japanese papermaking, a framework can be developed for making and growing materials and forms that are contingent on relationships between local communities of humans and nonhumans. The Anthropocene calls for radical propositions for sustainable fashion design practices. In response, this study aims to develop a theoretical and conceptual framework for interspecies collaborative design in fashion. This dissertation found that two hierarchies underpin the unsustainable practices of the dominant fashion industry: the primacy of producer over consumer, and human over nature. Sustainable fashion research needs to address these hierarchies. This study showed that they are being destabilized by consumers who act as producers themselves and find ways to exert their agency over fashion’s supply chain through practices that value collaboration, openness, and transparency. Outlined in this dissertation are the theoretical and conceptual foundations for interspecies fashion design in the Anthropocene—a form of design that addresses the ecological negligence of the dominant fashion industry. The result is a framework for nascent fashion design practices that seek to bridge the biological, social, and technological in the Anthropocene. With von Busch (2013), this dissertation asks: How can we support the development of Do-it-Together community-based design methods, rather than Do-it-Yourself ones? And with Haraway (2007) it asks: Can these communities be extended to include nonhuman kin?