Author: muj205

Name: Mehr Un Nisa Javed 

Professor: Nimrah Syed 

Date: 3rd March’2019 

Objective: Write a reading response to Week III reading. 

Reading Response:

I really liked this reading for several reasons. Firstly, it was very consumer-centric as it was talked about in the reading that during the design process focusing on the individual people rather than on target market enhances the sustainability. When designing the clothes it is quite important to see people wearing them and interacting with them and that is only possible when the garments are long-lasting so that people can develop emotional attachment with the clothes. Hence, this sense of great well-being derived from the clothing would help people to love their own self. This made me really think about my own self and how I have developed emotional attachment with one of the shirts I have. It is about 3 years old but I still keep it in my closet and try to wear it as much as possible because it makes me feel really confident. 

“They are wearing clothes that represent who they are. Instead of creating stereotypes and generalized looks, we are creating a clothing environment that supports and sustains individual well-being”. This is the gist of the reading as the main goal in the fashion industry and for the designers should be to cater the needs of the consumers in a way which is not harmful for the environment and also fits the consumers needs. 

Name: Mehr Un Nisa Javed
Professor: Nimrah Syed
Date: 26th Feb’2019

Reading Response:

Sarah Scaturro argues in her article “Eco-Tech Fashion: Rationalizing Technology in Sustainable Fashion” (Fashion Theory, Vol.12) that if we want more of sustainable fashion then we need more incorporation of Technology. Scaturro shows that the ” “technology can be envisaged negatively as a hierarchical deterministic force driving consumption and commoditization, thus leading our environment into an inequitable stasis, disembodying us from our natural world, which leads us to question the authentic qualities of living in a technocratic society”. The negative view about the usage of technology can be considered as “ecocentric” and the opposing opposite of it is termed “techno-centric”. It is argued by Scaturro that “balancing the dismay regarding the role current technologies play in the fast fashion system alternate belief that the right technologies, when selectively developed and applied, can play an integral role in the growth of sustain- able fashion”. This shows that we need to develop such technology which would benefit but at the same time we must keep its cons in mind.

According to Scaturro, the role of technology in sustainable fashion is broken into two main categories: the physical manifestation and the digital part. The digital part focuses more upon the usage of Internet for sustainable fashion and leads to more aware consumptions. For example, more usage of websites like Taobao which offer ecological and ethical and ecological goods for people.

This shows that Scaturro believes that the eco-tech based fashion is a great way for pushing the sustainable fashion industry forward. I really agree with her idea as well and believe that it would be a great replacement for the old-school fashion industry by creating some effective communication and compromises between all the people involved in the garments production cycle i.e. retailer, manufacturers, consumers, designers and researchers.

Name: Mehr Un Nisa Javed
Professor: Nimrah Syed
Date: 24th Feb ‘ 2019

Title: “The life-cycle of the fashion garment and the role of Australian mass market designers”

Objective: Reading Response

Reading Response:

The main issue raised by the reading was that how the Australian mass market leads to harmful environmental impacts and the possibilities for sustainability in the Australian mass market. After that life-cycle assessment is done to evaluate the impact of of the products produced. After that the speed in the market is analyzed and links it with the fast fashion where the clothes are considered as a disposable commodity. Further, the fibre use is discussed where it can be seen that mostly people prefer to buy the cheaper fibre such as polyester and when in 2010, the prices of cotton rose then the people switched more towards cotton-grade polyester so they could have a cheap substitute. This shows that people care less for the environment and so the demand for natural fibers further decreased because they are very costly to consume. Later, the writer covers all the phases of the garment life cycle such as textile production, garment design, manufacturing, distribution, retail, garment use and Disposal, reuse and cradle-to-cradle alternatives. In all these phases mainly the environmental impacts are assessed.

I really liked this reading because it is like a business cycle where are the phases are discussed which would make the readers more conscious about their choices and most importantly, it creates awareness amongst the producers/retailers who would go through each stage and could possibly minimize the harmful impact by ethical practices. However, at the same time they would be challenged by doing all ethical and environmental friendly practices. For example, a retailer or producer could get at loss because since he would be doing everything in a more suitable way the he would need to increase the prices which would in turn affect the consumers base.

Overall, this reading had some great lessons but I believe, it is still quite difficult to implement the theory into reality.

Name : Mehr Un Nisa Javed
Professor: Nimrah Syed
Date:22nd Feb’2019

Partners: Samanta and Jennifer.

URL of the Presentation: https://docs.google.com/presentation/d/198ETLYYKEmfw-gvRuK8xV6XIXN7aCQVDHhfMdpfm9XQ/edit?usp=sharing

Objective: select different textile materials and present their properties, usage, trends and contributions in the industry along with documentation submission
The first thing which we did as the starting point for this research was that we first looked into our closets and checked what kind of fabrics do we have, which type are in excess, which we purchase in low amounts and which sort of fabrics we do not have at all. Then, For this presentation as we worked in a group of 3 where we spilt the work i.e. Samanta worked upon the synthetic fibers and their properties and usages and I worked upon the natural fibers i.e. wool, silk, cotton etc and their properties and usages. Finally, Jennifer picked the area of trends and diff. textile materials contribution in the fashion industry.

The most important natural fabrics which I chose were cotton (which is breathable and inexpensive), Linen (one of the oldest fabrics), wool(an excellent insulator of heat), silk(expensive but…) etc. I really enjoyed working on this assignment as I got to know about many new different fabrics which I was unaware of but they had great advantages. However, at the same time it made me really conscious about my usage of different fabric and how harmful they could be for the planet. For instance, when I recalled my recent purchase which was a fabric Viscose then I realized that how bad it could have been for our Mother Earth because the production solvent for Viscose is carbon disulphide which is highly toxic and its unsafe release of solvents in water can typically have hazardous impacts. This made me realize that we must make informative decision of investing in different fabrics instead of just picking up any random one by following the trend.

Overall, I really liked the overall coordination we had in a group and the way we all split the work to make it more efficient and share ideas which would have qn everlasting impact and would lead to more conscious decisions.

Here are some screenshot from the presentation to elaborate what it was basically about:

The first thing we did was that we looked at our wardrobes to see our consumption:

Next, we ran through the different types of fabrics available in the market:

This shows that the most dominating one is polyester since its cheap and readily available due to its mass production 

Then, we ran through the natural fibers which are expensive yet not very damaging for our planet

An example for it could be silk which is extremely expensive and can’t be used for a long period of time yet its consumption can still lead towards sustainability. 

Later, we noticed the environmental impacts of various textiles. They have disastrous affects in all parts of the world because the recycling of the clothing is less than 1% which gives producers a chance to produce in bulks to satisfy the demands of the consumers. 

Finally, for the last part we worked upon the innovations in the textile industry. There have been quite a lot of advancements due to the wide use of technology around the world. Now, there are many sustainable practices being done around the globe so that our planet can be save. A few of the new textile innovations are Wood Fibre Yarn Technology, using infrared heat etc. 

Note: Haven’t submitted late just did not know about the photos feature so updated my documentation (and it is posted on Friday because on the syllabus it did not say anywhere that it was due on the day of presentation so I was not aware of it or possibly because I missed the first class because I got enrolled late in the class). 

Tim Ingold, who is an anthropologist suggested that Ethnography is a way of conducting research “to describe the lives of people other than ourselves, with an accuracy and sensitivity honed by detailed observation and prolonged first‐hand experience” (2008a:69). I really liked this quote and understood it quite well as I have been taking many social science classes which are related to observation i.e. participant or non-participant observation. I quite agree that when we are observed by someone else lens then we can be more sufficiently and realistically seen instead of viewing ourselves on our own. Therefore, ethnography holds great importance as it has great amount of fieldwork involved.

I also really liked where they supported short term Ethnography over long term ethnography. They have also cleared in the minds of the readers that there is no point to consider the short term ethnography as inferior because many people think that it is usually conducted due to time constraints and deadlines etc.

Here, I would like to add that one of our classmate shared his story of being a part of the short ethnography study in Shanghai and he found it too fruitful and made useful conclusions by conducting a participant and non-participant research.

Finally, I feel like the article was a bit hard to focus on and I lost my interest in the middle because it lacked a lot of proofs to support their saying and mainly some interesting examples.