Suchergebnisse

This article investigates the role of the Australian Modern Slavery Act 2018 as a reporting mechanism aimed at preventing the use of forced labour in global supply chains. In the fashion industry, modern slavery legislation pursues the ambitions of activist movements that have long campaigned for increased knowledge about supply chain practices to improve the labour conditions of garment workers, especially for those in the Global South. In recent years, such campaigns against the entrenched opacity of the global fashion system have given rise to a transparency industry built on practices of auditing and supply chain management, including in relation to modern slavery legislation. This article analyses 10 modern slavery statements submitted to the online Modern Slavery Register by fashion brands operating in Australia in the 2019–2020 reporting period to explore how the Modern Slavery Act 2018 participates in colonial relations of power. It focuses on three aspects of the statements: factory reporting and third-party auditing, corporate grievance mechanisms, and risks associated with COVID-19. Finally, the article argues that while improved transparency can generate positive outcomes for workers, the reporting required by modern slavery legislation is often more concerned with providing assurances about labour standards to consumers and stakeholders in the Global North than with the needs or experiences of workers in the Global South.

This article investigates the role of the Australian Modern Slavery Act 2018 as a reporting mechanism aimed at preventing the use of forced labour in global supply chains. In the fashion industry, modern slavery legislation pursues the ambitions of activist movements that have long campaigned for increased knowledge about supply chain practices to improve the labour conditions of garment workers, especially for those in the Global South. In recent years, such campaigns against the entrenched opacity of the global fashion system have given rise to a transparency industry built on practices of auditing and supply chain management, including in relation to modern slavery legislation. This article analyses 10 modern slavery statements submitted to the online Modern Slavery Register by fashion brands operating in Australia in the 2019–2020 reporting period to explore how the Modern Slavery Act 2018 participates in colonial relations of power. It focuses on three aspects of the statements: factory reporting and third-party auditing, corporate grievance mechanisms, and risks associated with COVID-19. Finally, the article argues that while improved transparency can generate positive outcomes for workers, the reporting required by modern slavery legislation is often more concerned with providing assurances about labour standards to consumers and stakeholders in the Global North than with the needs or experiences of workers in the Global South.

Abstract
Rei Kawakubo/Comme des Garçons: Art of the In-Between, Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, 4 May–4 September 2017

Abstract
In Subculture: The Meaning of Style ([1979] 1988), Dick Hebdige noted that 'somewhere between Trenchtown and Ladbroke Grove the cult of Rastafari had become a "style": an expressive combination of "locks," of khaki camouflage and "weed"'. For cultures of resistance such as Rastafari, aesthetic determinants are more than simple visually identifying features. Rather, these elements are the foundation of unity, a shared aesthetic that points to a shared world-view, a shared consciousness or livity. However, in the processes of cultural appropriation, the significance of such aesthetic qualities are often entirely re-determined. This article considers the cultural appropriation of Rastafari in the context of Aotearoa New Zealand in order to reflect upon the intricate ways in which the aesthetic elements of culture play into the processes of appropriation. In so doing, this article illustrates the contradictions and ambiguities involved in processes of cultural appropriation and suggests that such processes be considered in relation to their contextual adoption, rather than by way of simple reductionist binaries.

Abstract
Clothes have a significant presence in literature, in terms of both the construction and the reconstruction of a historical moment and its literary representations. Of particular interest in this article is the role of clothes and sartorial fashion in the aesthetics of such historical moments, and how the literary representation of dress contributes to the production of distinctive national aesthetics in the antipodes – New Zealand and Australia. In particular, this article considers the use of light and dark in the dress represented in two contrasting texts, in order to explore the ways in which fashion functions in the writing of melancholia. The aesthetics of melancholia are determined by both light and dark, not simply by darkness. It is the contrast between the two that produces the sense of unease and loss that engenders the melancholy aesthetic. In considering the use of light and dark in the sartorial aesthetics of two antipodean literary texts it is possible to reflect upon the particularities of sartorial aesthetic modes in order to open up questions concerning the role of literary fashion in the construction of national aesthetic identity.