Student feedback to Academics
Prae Chaiphet Instagram @PraeChaiphet, is an MA graduate at London College of Fashion, now looking for PhD funding. She is also a valued member of FACE educating white academics on the FACE Associates programme. She tells us her important story.
TRIGGER WARNING for South East Asian Women
Looking back on my MA journey, I didn’t know what kind of support I needed until I was provided with it by my tutors. "I will never understand but I will always listen." and “we’re all here for you,” were simple sentences I heard in the early stage of my project. Behind these words, I can feel their intention to create a safe space filled with kindness and compassion and their willingness to learn.
So, thank you to my teaching team at MA Womenswear London College of Fashion, Nabil El-Nayal (course leader), my technician, Navin Patel (technician), Jessica Saunders (programme director) and Sarah-Ann Smith (pattern cutting lecturer) for always reassuring me when fear and anxiety were a big part of my educational experience. Hatred in the news of my people and my past traumas needed to be overcome. In a fitting room with my teaching team, I felt safe like I really could make my voice heard.
But this wasn’t always the way. After initially presenting my research to justify my research question, one lecturer objected "Racism against people is one thing, objectification of women is a second thing. This is not a political strategy course. This is a fashion design course.” I broke down crying in front of the whole class. During my time at school and university, I've never processed the microaggressions and racism from my peers and tutors. I've learned to strengthen my suppression skill. The anti-Asian hate, the Atlanta shooting left, me no choice but to change my approach; this lecture was my last straw.
Then I joined the project "under-represented" created by my BA tutor, Michelle Muirhead at Kingston School of Art who is a FACE member.
Then I joined the project "under-represented" created by my BA tutor, Michelle Muirhead at Kingston School of Art who is a FACE member. Witnessing racially minoritised students receiving support and encouragement from their peers and academics in the process of unpacking their individual experiences of discrimination and shame around their cultural identity was an uplifting and healing experience. It was something I wish I’d had earlier. I joined FACE shortly after the project ended. At first, contributing to FACE conversations with white academics, I spoke with a slightly shaking voice. I felt overwhelmed looking at my screen, my body perceived the humans on my Zoom screen as a threat. But everyone listened and asked honest questions. Being heard and seen by white academics, I slowly felt more empowered to share my views. My power, my voice, and my lived experience keep pushing me to continue this fight.
Witnessing racially minoritised students receiving support and encouragement from their peers and academics in the process of unpacking their individual experiences of discrimination and shame around their cultural identity was an uplifting and healing experience.
My Project
The project seeks to answer the question, “How can I raise awareness of the exploitation and objectification of Southeast Asian women through my fashion practice” and to investigate the roots of racial stereotypes and the suffering Southeast Asian women are collectively experiencing and contextualise the form of oppression that caused it. The outcome: a wearable art installation, is a physical manifestation of the unseen collective trauma of Southeast Asian women, aiming to amplifying their unheard voice that exists under a system of patriarchy and white supremacy.
How can I raise awareness of the exploitation and objectification of Southeast Asian women through my fashion practice?
During the beginning of the Covid-19 pandemic in 2020, racial slurs and physical abuse towards East and Southeast Asians (ESEA) increased dramatically. "UK police data suggests a rise of 300 percent in hate crimes towards Chinese, East, and Southeast Asians in the first quarter of 2020 compared with the same period in 2018 and 2019." (Matsuda, 2021).
On 16th March 2021, Robert Long went on a shooting spree at three massage parlours in Atlanta, killing six Asian-American women. Initially, Forbes news reported FBI Director saying that “the Atlanta Shooting 'Does Not Appear' Racially Motivated”; local police officer also claimed that the shooting was motivated by sex addiction, not hatred of Asians. (Walsh, 2021).
Seeing news regularly of ESEA communities being attacked and sometimes killed, led me to question how I could explore such a vast subject as racism within the fashion context; however, when I also considered misogyny and sexism ignored amidst Atlanta shooting news, my perspective shifted. I started reflecting on my lived experience as a Thai woman and questioning my intersectional identity within the Western society which I call home, my indoctrination by a white society on white supremacy, and my role as a fashion designer/human being.
I started reflecting on my lived experience as a Thai woman and questioning my intersectional identity within the Western society which I call home, my indoctrination by a white society on white supremacy, and my role as a fashion designer/human being.
There is a long history of the dominating Western powers playing a crucial role in creating structural exploitation and objectification of Southeast Asian women. I have identified key areas in which Southeast Asian women are sexually exploited and objectified. Firstly rape of women was used as a military strategy to humiliate the (male) enemy. Secondly, the Deployment of women for military prostitution for Rest and Recreation during the Vietnam war (1955 - 1975) led to the industrialisation of prostitution which then manifested as modern-day sex tourism where “development of tourist industries bringing in foreign exchange for economic development”. Lastly, the mail order bride trade, an industry trafficking women in prostitution, women in poverty, or women trying to find a way out of their country to marry foreign men. (Barry, 1995)
Sexual exploitation by a patriarchal society leads sex workers to become scapegoats and yet, the men who created the demand are not seen as the root cause.
Sexual exploitation by a patriarchal society leads sex workers to become scapegoats and yet, the men who created the demand are not seen as the root cause. This view is supported by statistics reported by Kuo (2000), Between 1957 and 1964, when the USA established seven military bases in Thailand, the number of prostitutes rose from 20,000 to 400,000. Recently, the number of tourists who visit Thailand annually for sex tours has risen to 5.4 million; approximately 60 percent of Thailand's tourists visit solely for sexual purposes. Additionally, “Thailand has a reputation for engaging in one of the largest child sex trade operations in Southeast Asia.
UNICEF estimates the number of Thai children involved in prostitution to be between 60,000 and 200,000. A Thai organisation also called FACE: the coalition to Fight Against Child Exploitation, claimed that 5,000 foreigners come to Thailand each year to have sex with children. The organization described the average sex tourist as a middle-aged white male from either Europe or North America who often goes online to find the best deals “One Website promised "nights of sex with two young Thai girls for the price of a tank of gas." (Marques, 2006) Travel brochures further perpetuate stereotypes of the submissiveness of Asian prostitutes, urging a global clientele to explore the Asia sex trade.
This harmful representation of tourism in Southeast Asia has been widely acknowledged on a global scale and led to misrepresented racial stereotypes being normalised, causing casual microaggressions and presumptions which affect all Southeast Asian Women as well as misogyny-affected identities.
I used questions raised by Michel Foucault in “Why Study Power? The Question of the Subject” as a way to navigate the complex layers of oppression that overpower Southeast Asian women. “How does power manifest itself?” but “By what means is it exercised?” and “What happens when individuals exert (as they say) power over others?”
The first power, the “Leg of Mutton Sleeve” is the manifestation of the thin veil of systematic racism/sexism, keeping the experience of Southeast Asian women vaguely hidden.
Photography: Karuna Priya
Model : Jadean Francis
During the Victorian era, Thailand culturally assimilated to avoid colonisation from Britain. The leg of mutton sleeve blouse (a Victorian style) was adopted to be worn as part of Thai traditional garment. Once worn over the body, the power is exercised by blurring the vision of the wearer, causing a struggle to see reality. A metaphor for how living life through the “white lens” indoctrinates us into (unconsciously) feeling inferior, or not belonging, trapped in our own racialised body.
The second power, the “Trapped in Red Light District Cage” above is a manifestation of overwhelming and endless demands of sexual pleasure, glamourised into false happiness; the patriarchal society’s way to escape from the self, pain, and emotions.
Photography Ana Blumenkron
“The first act of violence that patriarchy demands of males is not violence toward women. Instead patriarchy demands of all males that they engage in acts of psychic self-mutilation, that they kill off the emotional parts of themselves. If an individual is not successful in emotionally crippling himself, he can count on patriarchal men to enact rituals of power that will assault his self-esteem.” (hooks, b, 2004) Once worn, the body immediately feels a restriction of movement and a burden weighing down on one shoulder, causing a physical/visceral reaction.
The first act of violence that patriarchy demands of males is not violence toward women. Instead patriarchy demands of all males that they engage in acts of psychic self-mutilation
(hooks, b, 2004)
The third power, the “Gold Digger Dress' above, is a manifestation of the pre-made identity Southeast Asian women are born into. The power is exercised over us through the normalisation of “severe” racial stereotypes which are treated by Western society as “casual”, followed by an act of gaslighting, leaving the subjects to constantly question their truth and identity, or perhaps, even objectify their own body.
References
Barry, K. (1994) The Prostitution of Sexuality. New York: NYU Press.
Foucault, M. (1982) The Subject and Power. The University of Chicago Press, pp.777-795
Marques, L. (2006) Southeast Asia a Haven for Pedophiles. Available at: https://abcnews.go.com/US/story?id=2325416&page=1 (Accessed: 17.09.21).
Hook, B. (2004) The Will to Change: Men, Masculinity, and Love. Washington Square Press.
Kuo, M. (2000) 'Asia's Dirty Secret: Prostitution and Sex Trafficking in Southeast Asia', Harvard international review, pp. 42-45.
Matsuda, T. (2021) It’s time to talk about anti-Asian racism in the UK Available at https://www.aljazeera.com/opinions/2021/4/1/its-time-to-talk-about-anti-asian-racism-in-the-uk (Accessed on 11.04.21)
Walsh, J. (2021) FBI Director Says Atlanta Shooting ‘Does Not Appear’ Racially Motivated. Available at: https://www.forbes.com/sites/joewalsh/2021/03/18/fbi-director-says-atlanta-shooting-does-not-appear-racially-motivated/?sh=94758941a0de (Accessed: 03.05.21)